After a weekend of night meets at Slammedenuff Gatlinburg, the sensible way home was the interstate. We took the Dragon instead.
At the bottom of it, in a car park full of sport bikes and riders comparing knee sliders, sat something nobody expected: a white Acura NSX, so wide and so low it looked like it had driven out of a 2003 tuning magazine. And on its roof, strapped down with red and blue ratchet straps, a roof box.
The Tail of the Dragon
US 129 crosses from Tennessee into North Carolina at Deals Gap. The 11-mile stretch from the state line to the southern end of the Foothills Parkway is the Tail of the Dragon, one of America's most famous roads for motorbikes and sports cars. Locals like to say it has 318 curves in those 11 miles. The real count is lower, but nobody who has driven it complains about a shortage of corners.
At the North Carolina end sits the Deals Gap Motorcycle Resort, which calls itself the official home of the Dragon: a fuel stop, a shop full of Dragon T-shirts and the car park where everybody stops to cool off and talk about the run.
Sources: Wikipedia: U.S. Route 129 and Tail of the Dragon.
Old money
The NSX was Honda's mid-engined supercar, sold in America under the Acura badge. Most owners keep them stock. Whoever built this one did the opposite, in the full-commitment style of the 2000s tuning era: a complete widebody with fixed headlights set into cut-outs where the pop-ups used to be, a scoop on the roof, deep side intakes and front arches that swallow the wheels.
We were told the kit is one of two. We haven't been able to confirm the maker, so treat that as car-park knowledge for now. What's certain is that you won't see another one at your local meet. The car sits on silver Enkei split-spoke wheels with Bridgestone Potenza tyres, and in the grille, a few autumn leaves picked up somewhere on the Dragon.
The back end
Walk around the back and it gets better. Four round taillights replace the NSX's light bar, a big rear wing stands on black uprights with chrome-ringed cut-outs, and four exhaust tips poke out above a big diffuser. When we posted the car, our caption asked the obvious question: are those Lamborghini Diablo taillights? We still don't know. Answers welcome.
And then there's the roof box, a grey Karrite Voyager, strapped down on a rack right in front of the wing. It's the least aerodynamic thing ever fitted to an NSX, and the most honest: this car gets driven, on long trips, on roads like this one.
Why it stays with us
The 2000s gave tuning some of its wildest ideas, and most of those cars have since been sold, put back to stock or left in a garage. This one is still out there doing exactly what it was built for, wearing a widebody that most people have only seen in old magazines, on one of America's greatest driving roads. With a roof box.
For another rare widebody, see the RWB Porsche 997 at RAUH-Welt HQ.
Photos: One Breath Pictures.
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