Tamiya Stadium Blitzer Project

If you try to research the difference between Trophy Trucks, Short Course Trucks, and Stadium Trucks, you'll find a confusing cacophony of conflicting data.  I gave up and just concluded that these are all purpose built racing trucks based on the general appearance of real consumer trucks, but usually actually made from a tube frame chassis and use a fiberglass body shell.  This makes them a great subject for an RC model.  The body of the 58106 Stadium Blitzer, originally released in 1992, certainly looks like it is based on one of these genres, but the chassis makes me question that theory.  Real racing trucks aren't likely to have monster truck tires and a super wide track.  So what is this thing supposed to be exactly?  Let's take a look at the history of the Tamiya models that use this type of body and see if we can figure it out.

• It all seems to have started with the 58081 Nissan King Cab and 58086 Toyota Hilux on the Monster Racer chassis in 1989-1990.  These had the distinctive Trophy Truck bodies but a 2WD Monster Truck chassis.
• The most realistic Trophy Trucks were the 58136 Toyota Prerunner (re-using the Hilux body), 58146 Chevy S-10, and 58161 Ford F-150 released in 1994-1995.  These all used the 4WD TA-02 touring chassis and scale sized tires.
• The series I'll call the Blitzers are the 58106 Stadium Blitzer, 58122 Blitzer Beetle, and 58181 Stadium Thunder, released in 1992-1996.  These used a derivative of the 2WD Falcon buggy chassis but with huge tires.
• Honorable mention go to the 58511 Nissan Titan (DT-02), 58537 Desert Fielder (TA-02T re-using the Toyota Hilux body), 58552 Asterion (XV-01T re-using the Chevy S-10 body), and 58579 Land Freeder (CC-01).  These all use different chassis that have nothing to do with a real trophy truck but the bodies kind of look like one.

Did that clear things up?  Not at all.  The 58056 Falcon came out in 1986.  It was a 2WD buggy with a bathtub chassis, front wishbone suspension, and rear trailing arms.  It sold very well as a beginner's kit, yet the chassis wasn't used for anything else until the 58093 Bear Hawk 5 years later which changed almost everything.  Both front and rear suspension were new (trailing arms were gone), and the oil shocks were replaced by the dreaded "friction dampers".  That didn't revive the platform, so why not change even more?  From 1992-1996 Tamiya released the 58106 Stadium Blitzer, the 58122 Blitzer Beetle, and the 58181 Stadium Thunder.  All three used the newest version of what was left of the Falcon chassis with long suspension arms and big wheels.  Two of these stadium truck style vehicles used pickup truck style bodies, but the Blitzer Beetle brought back the hard body from the Sand Scorcher.  I'm partial to the Beetle body myself, but the stadium truck bodies are probably more realistic to a real vehicle, but not by much.

All three of the stadium truck Falcons were re-released between 2010 and 2012 in the same order as the originals.  I have the 58482 version of the Stadium Blitzer from 2010.  From what I can tell, it is virtually unchanged from the original.  Because of the wide stance and long travel suspension, this is a very stable vehicle.  It can handle pavement, gravel, and grass with equal grace.  It is quite quick for its size and even jumps pretty well.  I really have no complaints.  For the price, it performs very well.  With those big tires, you don't even notice the lack of 4WD under most conditions.

Update:  This model was destroyed in the 2022 fire.  It has not been replaced.

Page 1: Assembly

Page 2: Final Photos