“We settled on this model not out of admiration for Mao, but out of patriotism,” Yan, a regular on the renowned Paris-Dakar event, told AFP.
The Red Flag, a boxy black limo with distinctive round headlights and an enormous metal front grille, has long been the vehicle of choice for the top echelons of China’s Communist Party.
In 1958 during a visit to a state-run car factory, Mao — who was then being driven around in a Soviet-made vehicle — bemoaned the fact he could not travel in a Chinese-made car.
No sooner said than done: a “shock team” was formed with the express ambition of creating a Chinese limousine for the Great Helmsman.
Taking its name from a popular communist slogan and its technology largely from overseas, the cars were in production by the late 1950s.
And to this day, the limousines — which now mostly use German car maker Audi’s technology — are still trotted out to ferry the regime’s top leaders around with pomp and ceremony.
In September 2015, at an event marking the anniversary of the end of the Second World War, President Xi Jinping cruised sedately down Beijing’s longest avenue standing in a convertible Red Flag and saluting the soldiers lining the route.
– ‘Delirious’ reception –
The JJ-Sports cars are built by the team themselves, using Chevrolet engines and with the bodywork inspired by the Red Flag’s designs, complete with staring headlights and the distinctive grille.
“When we passed the border with Kazakhstan to China the crowds were delirious,” Yan said.
“Customs officials and Chinese soldiers all came to take pictures with the car. The oldest, who were born in the 50s, even cried — it reminded them of their youth,” he added.
The Red Flag lookalikes are, he hopes, a way to bring motor sports to a broader audience in China. The sport was almost non-existent in the 1980s, but is now booming.
By next year China will have nine professional race tracks, according to the Chinese Federation of Motor Sports.
And this September, it will host its second ever World Rally Championship (WRC) event — rallying’s highest level — seventeen years after its first in 1999.
On the Silk Way Rally, the best-placed of JJ-Sports’ three drivers, Li Aidong, is currently 34th.
The race is “a chance for us to challenge the legends like Sebastian Loeb”, the WRC’s most successful ever driver, said manager Yan.
“Our goal is not to finish first — it is to fly the Chinese flag and reach the finish line in Tiananmen Square,” — the Red Flag limousine’s natural habitat, when participating in parades.
“We’d have come full circle.”