In the 1970s, it was not particularly difficult for very small teams, usually British and consisting of four or five people, to buy a Ford Cosworth engine, a Hewland gearbox, a set of racing tires, and assemble a "garage" Formula 1 car around them. Even on the other side of the world, in Japan, Honda’s competitive sports era in the 1960s had sparked a major motorsport enthusiasm that did not subside even after the Japanese manufacturer withdrew from racing. These factors contributed to the birth of the Maki team, founded in 1973 by manager Kenji Mimura and designer engineer Masao Ono, with the support of experienced New Zealand driver Howden Ganley.
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| MAKI F101C |
In March 1974, Mimura, Ono, and Ganley held a press conference at the Carlton Tower Hotel in London to launch the new team and present their plans, which included building their own engine and starting a chassis production to sell to customer teams. However, in reality, the world of Formula 1 was far more demanding than the three had imagined, and their project of creating a great all-Japanese team soon clashed with financial difficulties and the severe lack of resources of the tiny team. Nevertheless, a first single-seater was assembled, the Maki F101, which adopted fairly conventional technical solutions for the time, such as an aluminum monocoque chassis housing the classic Ford Cosworth DFV V8 engine paired with a Hewland FG 400 gearbox. The Japanese car was extremely spartan, with a large snowplow-like nose, but above all, with poorly conceived aerodynamics due to the oversized air intake, which significantly interfered with the airflow directed toward the rear wing.
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| MAKI F101 |
The side pods were very bulky and contained radiators positioned quite far forward, but the lack of sufficient vents on the bodywork made the cooling system inefficient, exposing the engine to dangerous overheating. From the outset, the car proved to be unstable and severely overweight, weighing over 700 kg—about 130 kg more than rival cars. Given all these issues, Ganley refused to race the car, instead offering the team his own workshop in England to reduce the car’s weight before making its World Championship debut. The debut eventually took place at the 1974 British Grand Prix, where the car failed to qualify, lapping more than four seconds slower than the pole position time. Things did not improve at the following German Grand Prix, on the contrary, due to a suspension failure, Ganley suffered a serious accident in which he sustained multiple fractures, effectively ending his racing career.
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| MAKI F101C |
It was only in 1975, with an entirely blue livery thanks to new sponsor Citizen, that the small Japanese team reappeared in Formula 1 and attempted to qualify for the British Grand Prix with Japanese driver Hiroshi Fushida at the wheel of the new Maki F101C. This car was little more than a mechanical update of the previous model but featured significantly improved aerodynamics on the nose and side pods. However, once again, the car failed to qualify. For the next three Grands Prix, it was entrusted to the more experienced Tony Trimmer, but given the poor performance of the F101C, he also failed to qualify for any races. To be fair, at the 1975 Dutch Grand Prix, given the small number of entries, all cars were admitted to the race, despite the Maki 101C posting a lap time 13 seconds slower than Lauda’s pole. Unfortunately, the car did not take part in the race, as its engine failed and the team had no spare available.
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