Sam Mitani

O. Sam Mitani (born May 29, 1966) is an award-winning Japanese-American writer and author, and the first Asian-American senior staff member of an English-language major automobile publication. He is best known for his work as International Editor for Road & Track magazine, where he spent 22 years, and as the author of a novel titled, The Prototype, which won the Gold Prize in the Thriller category of the 2019 Next Generation Indie Book Awards. Born in Tokyo, Japan, Mitani moved to the United States at the age of two.
His responsibilities as an automotive journalist included covering and test driving cars from around the world. His expertise and knowledge on Japanese automobiles make him one of the foremost authority on the subject. Mitani has also been published in magazines in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Japan. He wrote a monthly column for XaCAR, and regularly contributed to Best Car, two of Japan’s most popular auto magazines. His limited-run car magazine, called SPEED, won him a Maggie Award in 2004.
His travels around the world inspired him to also author a travel/adventure book, Fielding's Malaysia & Singapore: The Adventurer's Guide to the Wonders of Malaysia and Singapore and co-author Fielding’s Far East.
Mitani also appeared as a guest host for the Best Motoring DVD series and has an Emmy Award to his credit for co-hosting a special broadcast of the Los Angeles Motor Show for KABC’s Eye on LA television series.
As part of his job, he participated in a number of adventurous races, including the Dakar Rally in 1996 (then known as the Granda-to-Dakar Rally), as well as two stints in the Malaysian jungle in the Trans Peninsula Rally. He also drove in the Baja 2000, an off-road race through the famous desert peninsula. Also of note, he was part of the first American motorcycle tour of Vietnam since the war. The exploits of this trek was chronicled in Cycle World magazine.
In 2010, he set a speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats in a Suzuki Kizashi, going 203.73 mph. This run also qualified him to join the exclusive 200-MPH Club.
A practitioner of judo, Mitani holds a 5th-degree black belt; he also placed as high as third place at the World Masters Championship International Competition in São Paulo, Brazil.

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