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TCR Total Control Racing was a slotless track system that gave you more control over your racing cars than ever before. Because there were no slots for the cars to fit into like Scalextric, the TCR cars could change lanes. This was done by flipping a switch on the Hand Controller. However when the cars came to a bend they would always default to the outside of the bend due to gravity and centrifugal force. This meant that you could not overtake on the inside of a bend, something that was perfected by Matchbox's Lanechanger racing system. Most TCR sets that were sold came with the added bonus of a third vehicle, a Jam Car which travelled at a slightly slower speed than the two "racing" cars. This meant that in order to win a race you would have to negotiate this vehicle as well as your opponent. One set (the Zig Zag jam raceway) came with a nice Corvette Stingray that could be set to veer between both lanes at random moments, thus fouling up your perfect opportunity to slip past it.
As with other racing sets there was an illuminated version called the Lighted Jam Car Speedway The set I had as a kid was Crossfire. This was brand new at the time and came complete with the all new racing jeeps and the Pick Up Jam truck which actually came at you in the opposite direction. The set also had all the optional extras which were available separately on all but the most expensive sets. These were the speed equalizer which allowed you to match the speeds of the to racing cars so that you never had a faster car than your opponent and the totally crap lap counter which meant that your cars could clock up their laps mechanically providing you screwed a plastic Ariel to the back of the car. Also accompanying the Crossfire set was the four lane crossover section of track. When I got my one out of the box on Christmas Day this did not work because the current was not carried over to the other two lanes. Luckily dad was a dab hand with the soldering iron and had us up and running in a matter of minutes but never the less it was a bit frustrating. I guess that is part of Christmas though! Anyway, below for your perusal are some images. You know the drill. Just click on the thumbnail for a larger pic.
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