The Hino Contessa 1300 Coupe is a rare Japanese legend, renowned for its rear-engine layout and body styled by Italian master Giovanni Michelotti. Designed to enter the US market, it achieved shocking fame when Pete Brock’s BRE Racing team secured a surprise 1-2 victory at the 1966 Mission Bell 100 race. This success was short-lived; production abruptly ceased soon after when Toyota acquired Hino in 1966 to convert the company into its truck manufacturing division, making the Contessa an almost unobtainable classic.