His elder brother, Masayuki Matsushita served as a vice chairman of Panasonic for over a decade.

He instead worked his way up from the bottom, starting his career racing motorcycles in his home country between 1977 and 1980, before switching to four wheels.

In 1987, Matsushita started racing Formula Fords - the Class A of auto racing - In the following year, he teamed up with Jim Downing in a Camel Lights car and secured a second-place finish in class at the 24 Hours of Daytona and a third-place finish at the 12 Hours of Sebring.

He then tried Formula Pacific in New Zealand and became the first Japanese driver to win the prestigious Lady Wigram Trophy Race.

The same year, he earned his best career finish of 6th position at the Marlboro 500 at Michigan International Speedway.

He holds the record for most starts in American Championship Car Racing history without scoring a Top 5.

[17] In 1998, Nov 2, Hiro Matsushita was awarded Champion Culbs during the CART Year End Banquet at the Century Plaza in Los Angeles, California.