• Gerald Geluz is a long-time Honda enthusiast who figured if he was only going to own and drive one car, it might as well be his dream car.
• Influenced by lowriders and the street racing seen of the 1990s, this NSX’s modifications evolved over the years, with a lengthy list of parts from aero to nitrous finding their way onto this daily-driven street and show car.
• From the backroads to his daily commute, Gerald’s NSX served him well for many years, proving Honda’s claim that its NSX could be used every day.
• Gerald still owns the car, though its look has changed again and its duties as a daily driver finally have been passed on to another Honda in the garage.

A daily-driven supercar, in the era of the Testarossa, F40, GTO, Countach, Diablo, Zagato, and astronomically priced homologation specials? Not possible. That’s what everyone said when Honda released their NSX, the car that proved them all otherwise.

Compared to the other cars that Honda built it certainly wasn’t cheap upon release, but the NSX’s performance did approach—and in some cases surpass—the lofty heights of the exotics of its time. On paper, it was 80% as heavy as a Tesarossa and 70% as powerful, yet roughly 30% of the cost. The price point at which it was offered not only made the NSX more achievable as an affordable dream car, but it also meant that regular use felt far less prohibitive.

But its cost wasn’t why the NSX became Gerald Geluz’s dream car, initially experienced only through magazine articles from Car and Driver and the like. Instead, it’s because Honda managed to package its mid-engined Ferrari killer in such a way that it looked like a supercar, too. Three decades after its release, the design has aged well, and enthusiasts like Gerald have shown that an NSX can indeed be daily-driven.

MIGHT AS WELL

“If I’m only going to have and drive one car every day, it might as well be my dream car,” Gerald said. It wasn’t long after purchasing his 1991 NSX that Gerald started personalizing and enhancing it. He grew up loving low riders and the street racing scene in the 1990s, and previously owned an older CR-X. With many of his childhood friends driving Civics, all of them had their eyes on the ultimate Honda, so Gerald’s plan for his own NSX had been long in the making.

The car went through multiple iterations, including being wrapped both in pink and blue shades before Gerald decided to go through with a respray in BMW Individual Tanzanite Blue Metallic several years ago. At the time, the paintwork covered Advance GT front fenders paired with DaliRacing rear fender flares, as well as DaliRacing’s carbon-fiber rear diffuser and trunk lip spoiler. The huge Big Country Labs carbon-fiber rear wing speaks the same language as the Mode 4 front bumper and aggressive, angular UbeyMade canards. Together, these components and many others gave Gerald’s NSX a particular presence on the street.

INSIDE AND OUT

Even though the NSX was a daily-driven street car, Gerald didn’t want to compromise on his vision for how his dream car should look or how it should drive. To get low over the 17-inch front and 18-inch rear Volk Racing SE37Ks, Gerald opted to use a PannAuto air cup coilover system with Swift springs and AirLift Performance management. A StopTech big-brake kit was also added along with strut bars to round out the chassis updates.

Performance is bumped up by several bolt-ons including a Cantrell intake funnel mated to a PannAuto carbon-fiber intake assembly, DC Sports headers that feed a DaliRacing exhaust, and a 75-shot of nitrous oxide to complete that old-school street racer feel. A DaliRacing performance chip helps keep all the upgrades working together, and an OS Giken clutch assembly also has been installed.

Inside the cockpit, Recaro Pole Position seats in red scream Type R, while Takata harnesses and a Carbin roll bar complete the race-inspired look. They also serve to keep the driver firmly secured in proximity to the Momo steering wheel in the canyons and curvy backroads outside Los Angeles. In addition to duties as a daily driver, Gerald regularly took his NSX out for proper canyon drives in this guise. It may also come as no surprise that the NSX was brought to a variety of shows and events in this configuration as well.

RETIREMENT AGE

Years later, Gerald still has the car but no longer daily drives the NSX. But his tastes and his NSX haven’t stopped evolving throughout his ownership. The big wing and aero parts have been dialed back to something that appears aggressive but more on the OEM-plus side. The flashy lug nuts and bold blue color are gone. In their place, the car has become more refined and simplified, wearing a more subtle Corvette-sourced gray with a teal tinge and little hints of where it had been before.

Yet as much as some things change, others stay the same. The NSX brought that supercar feeling to a wider group, and it showed us that its nimble, exotic mid-engined feeling didn’t need to be exorbitantly expensive to acquire and operate. Long-term ownership and regular use of the first-generation NSX are possible and remain so to this day. For Gerald, this means those nostalgic supercar vibes are just a push of a button away. That’s just one good reason why Gerald’s NSX remains his dream car all these years later.

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