Altima Mk. I & II

The Nissan Altima was Nissan's factory-backed Car of the Future race car, campaigned by Kelly Racing / Nissan Motorsport from 2013 in two body evolutions (Mk. I and Mk. II). It was one of the new manufacturers the Gen I formula was designed to attract, alongside the Volvo S60 and Erebus's Mercedes-AMG E63.

A Nissan V8 on the control chassis

The Altima was built on the standard Car of the Future control chassis — a common safety cell with a rear-mounted transaxle (Albins, later XTrac sequential), control rear differential, E85 control fuel and the Dunlop control tyre. What made it distinctive was the engine. Where Ford and Holden ran established pushrod race V8s, the Altima's unit was derived from a production block: Nissan's VK56DE, the DOHC 5.6-litre V8 from the Patrol, Titan and Armada, reduced to the category's roughly 5.0-litre control displacement and reworked for racing. It was the first genuinely different engine architecture on the modern grid.

Body & aero

The race car took the four-door Altima silhouette. Nissan revised the car during its run — a second-evolution (Mk. II) body and aero package that sharpened the original 2013 design. As with all Gen I cars the shapes were aero-matched to a common target and are controlled by the technical rules; no per-car aero figures are published here.

Kelly Racing's programme

The programme was run by brothers Todd and Rick Kelly from their Melbourne base, which became Nissan Motorsport as the factory relationship deepened. Its significance was as much strategic as sporting: the first factory manufacturer alternative to Ford and Holden in the modern category, and Nissan's return to top-flight Australian touring-car racing. Nissan's factory backing ran across the Gen I era before winding down later in the decade.

Sources: verified spec catalog (COTF / Gen I control formula — Grade C; Nissan VK56-derived engine base — Grade D) + the Altima model article. The 5.6-litre figure is the road VK56; the race unit was reduced to the ~5.0-litre control formula. Final competition season is not asserted here (sources conflict).