So, how can a (failed) mid-size personal-luxury coupe marketed with peculiar muscle car stylings end up on the NASCAR circuit? We’re glad you asked.
Wanting nothing more than to succeed on the race track, Lee Iacocca went to great lengths to get none other than “The King” himself, Richard Petty, to use a Mirada in the NASCAR circuit. Petty and his team did, in fact, test one, but thanks to the front end (“inspired” by the Cords, if you remember), it had such poor aerodynamics that it made the car some 8 miles per hour slower than the Ford and GM offerings on the track.
Other teams also tested it, and all but one chose other manufacturer models. Arrington Racing, however, used it rather successfully (usually on the shorter tracks) from 1981 through 1984 and was able to achieve 15 top-ten finishes during that time. Both Dave Marcis and Dick May intermittently drove a Mirada during the ’81 season, but more often than not, the car either broke down or, if they were lucky, finished several laps down.
The production Mirada was about as successful as the NASCAR version. Chrysler only sold 52,947 units during its short production run, with more than half (27,165) in its launch year of 1980 alone. Sales literally plummeted year over year until, in ’83, it sold just 5,597 units, and Chrysler pulled the plug on the Mirada.
[Featured image by us44mt via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 2.0]
