At the behest of Reilly Brennan — the man with the largest tie-knot at the North American International Auto Show — our pal Paukert gave up on making the secretaries feel better in the Media Center and wandered through the displays, stumbling across what we already knew was the coolest non-exotic on the floor at Cobo: The Safari Rally-winning '74 Mitsubishi Lancer GSR.

After all, the rugged, diminutive sumbitch sedan has got a blackout hood, spare tires where the back seat should be, one of the raddest rally-stripe designs this side of David Starsky's Gran Torino and a set of econo mudflaps that add a sense of rapid pan-African urgency to the little four-door. It's mad style in spite of abject functionality. You can't make provenance like that up — it just happens. We want to kiss it. – Davey G. Johnson

Detroit Auto Show: 1974 Safari Rally-Winning Mitsubishi Lancer GSR 1600 [Winding Road]

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SUPER DETROIT UNVEILING POTENTIAL! Turbo Specialty Sports Sedan: Prototype X [Internal]

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