Fitch Phoenix

Once you've helped to design and build one of the world's most charming race tracks, the 1.5-mile (2.462 km) Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut, USA, opening in 1957 — why not design a car you can drive around on it?

John Fitch (d.2012) kept the Phoenix for as long as possible, and has only changed owners in recent years. There's only one. It's based on a Chevy. Coby Whitmore created, with Fitch, sketches that would be translated into a prototype by Intermeccanica in Italy.

Hell, there's an entire episode of Chasing Cars you can watch that's dedicated to this brilliantly weird take on the sports car.

Why yes, those are humps aft of the front fenders for one rear and one front spare tire. Why yes, it is using Chevrolet Corvair running gear, making it the rakish Porsche 911 competitor the world never got.

And, yes, showing a sports car at the 1966 New York Auto Show with its destiny tied to a car killed off in 1969 is one of the shortest stories I don't have to tell.

No odyssey needed: one Phoenix may have risen, but its future as a series production car went up in ashes.