Nissan released Friday a video and a name to accompany the teaser image we were given last week and brace yourselves, it has the letter “z” in it.
The Nissan Gripz Concept will be shown in Frankfurt first this year. According to Nissan, the crossover “concept” follows desert racers such as the 240Z and road-racing bicycles, apparently.
Nissan cleverly slipped in a “z” in the name, perhaps as a smokescreen that the Gripz could be the next-generation Juke (which is due in 2017), or perhaps as a signal that nothing in this world is sacred anymore. Earlier this year, Nissan design chief Shiro Nakamura said that the next-generation Z car could be something that appealed to different, younger buyers aka a crossover.
The Gripz grille and three-quarter view give the distinct impression that the car will follow the Nissan family of grilles and its aggressive roofline (we’ve adjusted the brightness below to show how dramatic it is) suggests that the crossover concept could be 2+2.
The Nissan Gripz Concept will be shown at Frankfurt later this month.
Well that would be the last of Nissan’s “man” cards.
I can’t imagine that the 370z sports car would get directly replaced by a Z badged crossover, but I don’t see anything wrong with a Z badged crossover on it’s own. Nissan still has a RWD chassis it can continue to share with Infiniti models, so it’s not like they can’t afford to develop a new Z.
Would you have believed 20 years ago that Porsche would primarily be a SUV builder?
Porsche didn’t replace the 911 with a CUV badged 911 though.
They added CUVs for profit/volume while continuing to build newer and faster versions of the sports cars they are known for.
Drawing strong conclusions based upon very fractured evidence here.
“Nissan design chief Shiro Nakamura said that the next-generation Z car could be something that appealed to different, younger buyers aka a crossover.”
When you click the link to the prior article within that quotation there, you’ll see he was not at all talking about crossovers, but rather a lighter, simpler sports car harking back to the 240Z. Nowhere was ANYTHING mentioned about a crossover.
“As for what the execution of the plan would entail, Nakamura says the new Z wouldn’t “necessarily go into the same category” as either the Mazda MX-5 Miata or the Toyota 86/Scion FR-S/Subaru BRZ, pointing to a photo of the GTR-LM Le Mans prototype as a sign of wanting to do something “unique” with the car. He adds the Z could fill the role recently vacated by the cancellation of the IDx four-passenger sports car, parts of which are expected to live on as part of a FWD offering.”
You need to stop doing this opinion injection into every article. For real.
“You need to stop doing this opinion injection into every article. For real.”
+1000
You fooled me with this click bait. Thanks.
It makes me all giddy fantasizing about how a guy could undo all of Nissan’s crossover-specific engineering on this all-things-to-all-people abomination and turn it into a proper Z.
So the value of my Z just went up? If Nissan does this they are all kinds of stupid… but they also built a convertible crossover and changed the Infinity G into a Q, so at this point I don’t put anything pass them. It would be a real shame to lose another sports car and its legacy to the cars-on-stilts craze.
The perfect weekend vehicle for all the hairy-chested…um…soccer moms out there?
While this news makes me sad, they will probably sell multitudes more than the last Z.
Crossovers = ca$h money for the manufacturer
proper rwd (semi)light weight sport coupes = Low sales volume, money loser
Ugh. The only concept vehicle I’ve liked lately was the IDx, and Nissan killed it.
This post is an obnoxious mix of clickbait and links that don’t really support the clickbait.
How about backing away from the Fox News “Truthiness” style of reporting?
Haven’t been this stoked since Levorg.