Supercars are supposed to lose weight over their life cycles, right? Not so the GT-R. It has hovered at, around and sometimes above the 1700kg mark for a while (the current version clocks in at 1740kg, the Nismo GT-R at 1720kg), and it’ll likely stay that heavy.

According to the GT-R’s ‘father’, Kazutoshi Mizuno, anyway. A while back he animatedly told TG that the legendary supercar had to be that heavy.

“All journalists say GT-R is heavy, heavy, heavy - it should be lighter, lighter, lighter! I say, journalists need to develop a more professional level of thinking! More study! More thought! The GT-R needs to be this weight. A car with less weight does not handle. Lighter weight can be dangerous, and it will not be driveable by all customers.”

He uses downforce as an example. “An F1 car weighs 560kg, more than 600kg with the driver,” he says. “How much downforce does an F1 car generate? Around 1300kg. So what is the total weight? 1860kg. A GT1 racing car weighs between 1200kg and 1300kg, plus downforce of 600kg, the actual weight on the car is 1800kg…”

With road cars unable to generate such vast downforce figures, that means we’re looking at a hefty kerbweight. “But with performance accessible to all customers. I have a big responsibility to the customer,” he once told us.

Top Gear talks to the ‘father’ of the GT-R