The GR Yaris Shoot-Out Collection: The Best of The GR Yaris on Fifth Gear! | Fifth Gear

one track, two cars and a stopwatch, it's a

shoot

out between old and new, in

fifth

gear

, with a simple question to answer which is faster. The world of rallying has given us some very special road cars that turn humble hatchbacks into four-wheel drive vehicles. Hooligans with devastating performance. Toyota has been away from this market for some time, their last decent effort was this 90's WRC Legend, the fancier gc4 st205, now they are back with the Yaris, yes a Yaris but looks can be deceiving because it The only thing it shares with your Nance car are its headlights. tail lights and antenna, this is the new Yaris 30 Grands engine with homologation specs, it's a bespoke machine and on paper it runs pretty close to that Sega rally hero, but which one is the fastest on the track first it's a cylinder this car is made famous really because Toyota didn't do anything good the factory cheated on the world body temp bike it had a very clever Turbo Air restrictor that basically gave them another 50 horsepower yeah , that was the year Colin McRae won the WRC for Subaru, you know, it's 20 odd years, the oldest, it's pretty good, you have to put in quite a bit of steering, but once the car is ready, I'll tell you that too This car was famous for remember the Seeger rally?

Well, it was the car we could do it in. I can do this, it's more like it now, this sd205 featured a neat and complicated suspension system called a super strut and, you know, a lot of different multi-links all designed to give incredible depression and I have to say the steering is very good and the old rally hero. crosses the line in a minute 25.2 that will do it is an old car we have to take care of it let's see if the newcomer can surpass it now this Yaris gr is a proper homologation special now in terms of performance these specifications are impressive in a five and a half second to 16 has most of 260 horsepower and a small three-cylinder engine.

Now, this is the most powerful production three-cylinder engine on the world circuit, which is basically some really good things, you know, it has 18-inch bbs4 and Alloys, it has a front, rear torque disc, the

best

part, three races and a half that are worth it. Sensational to drive almost 130 miles an hour now and it's just epic and fast now there are three driving modes, normal Sport and then track, and they basically change the Frontier torque cables so normal you have 60 in the front 40 in the rear so your sport is the other way around it's 30 in the front 70 in the rear and then on the track there's a 50 50 split it's got grip changes from such brilliant guys Steering brilliantly well God is good we should do a lap time on the first checkpoint, the Yaris is almost two and a half seconds ahead, well, the sun is in the way, I can't see where I'm going, you know what?

The front part is really sharp. and pointy at the second checkpoint, the gap is now four and a half seconds, come on honey, well I think we might have a low 17. how many 17s and something and I was right, the Yaris crosses the line in a minute, 17.72, that's a whopping seven seconds faster than the old silica, so while the silica is still a legend, this great grip and control of the gr has hit it on the track, this little iris is certainly my new favorite hot flash, this time we're getting down and dirty. With two beasts inspired by Japanese rallying, the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution 7 or EVO 7, as it is better known, and a Toyota Yaris GR, the fq 300 was the fastest version of the Evo 7 when it was launched in 2002, in fact, when

fifth

gear

launched it against Another highly rated rally bread machine, the Subaru Impreza WRX, it was two seconds quicker in two decades and we have Toyota's version of a rally car for the roads, although this one is not my first encounter with the rsgr because i drove it for the first time.

Two years ago, come on darling, that day it firmly tossed a fancier, high-spec Toyota into the weeds and left me with this conclusion: this nuke is certainly my new favourite, but I have a feeling Mitsubishi will give something a bit to the Toyota. harder to chew, let's start by rolling our ears if a rally fan of a certain age will remember that in the late 90s it was dominated by the Evo type of Palo mine, the great Tommy macaron won four WRC titles with the All In bats . evos, but it's only the Mega that's so successful that Mitsubishi produced 10 versions starting in 1992 and finally hung up its hat in 2016.

And it's not hard to see why these cars were so popular. almost anything on the roads, especially if you had a 310 horsepower fq 300 turbocharged engine in a small shell that weighed 3,000 pounds and by today's standards and being lightweight, the result is a zero to 62 time in 5 .1 seconds and a top speed of 157 miles. an hour, but since the Evo is first and foremost a rally car, the emphasis is not so much on traffic lights but on having a safe passage and maximizing grip on loose or slippery surfaces, it is about directing the power to the wheels that

best

they can use it. that's why it's four-wheel drive, but it goes much further.

It now also had an active center differential that could distribute power front to rear depending on what was needed and there is also a kit on the rear axle that activates its control. where you could actually individually put more power to one wheel to help the car turn and then there is another differential on the front axle to make sure the left or right wheel doesn't spin unnecessarily. Smarter things that you now know that even on asphalt you can feel. These systems like there I can feel how they transfer power from the front to the rear of the car here on really slippery surfaces you really notice it and there's a lot of stopping power thanks to the Brembo brakes everywhere now back when this car was new. you know, the brakes were amazing, obviously this one has had a bit of work and the brakes are a bit noisy, a lot of vibration, probably because they're a bit warped, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha , ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha , ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. o fluid air filter and revised exhaust to help the engine breathe better, this was supposed to reduce turbo lag but remember we are talking about a 20 year old car, now these cars are pretty big turbos and yes I mean , there is definitely nothing like a modern. turbo, but you know what's pretty fun because then you end up anticipating and getting power a little earlier than normal, waiting for the Boost to build, it makes it fun to drive these cars that you know, Vivo Subaru, back in the day.

It's impressive in terms of the way they handle the way they ride, I mean a really pointy front, great grip, brilliant balance, but they also make you feel alive, you know, how fast they move a little bit, that's simply epic, well, they are epic until the end. the brakes fail, turns out the brake fluid had boiled with all the excitement, however after a brief cool down normal service was restored and I started a quick spin, I hit the gas, power, power, power, come on , JP, plane on the crest of the star. Look, do you feel like Tommy MacKinnon?

God is fast, here we go, coming to the line, the stopwatch, the Evo 7 crosses the line in 48.58 seconds, did any of you eagle eyes see anything unusual on this car's license plate? This is exactly the same car we drove 20 years ago alongside the Yaris as the Evo did 20 years ago. The rsgi is campaigning in the World Rally Championship, but let's not kill each other. You know, those cars are a million miles away from the Yaris. You can get it at the Toyota dealer, so this GR comes with all the safety technology, soundproofing and luxury accessories that we expect from modern production cars and that means it's pretty strong.

Now you commented earlier that the Evo was quite light at 1360 kilos and To put this in context, this Yaris is half a meter shorter and yet it is only 50 kilograms lighter, so it is a small and heavy car, and although The GR is still the most powerful three-cylinder car you can buy, with 260 horsepower. its layout is still giving away 50 horses to the Mitsubishi, now do the numbers basically it means this Yaris has a lower power to weight ratio than the Evo and why this statistic is so important because it is the ultimate comparison figure when comparing two cars , knows?

If this car had twice the power but also twice the weight it wouldn't be faster, in fact it would be slower because Mass doesn't want to slow down and doesn't want to change direction, so maybe it's no surprise that The Yaris is almost half a second slower to 62 than the Evo, although the Toyota will benefit from the optional track package that has been fitted. This package doesn't add power, but it does add front and rear torsion differentials and a stiffer suspension setup that will ultimately mean better cornering for this type of bad ride. It also adds three and a half grams to the price, bringing the gm to £35,000.

Keep in mind that's only four grand more than the Evo 7 cost back in 2002. Let's get ready for a full lap, start the clock with phenomenal grip at the first checkpoint, the Yaris is half a second ahead here on this one. track mode, its 50 split torque is brilliant, the really tight front end holds the line and this is going to destroy the uh. Evo I think at the second checkpoint the lead has extended to three quarters of a second, the front is coming in now I can feel the rear moving a little. Wow, that's a really beautiful balance.

Stop the clock. The iris crosses the line in 47.15 seconds. It's 1.4 seconds faster than the Evo, so the new car wins by a good margin on this short Landau circuit. The Evo is still a very fast car and a lot of fun to drive, but it simply can't compete with the surprising balance of the little Toyota. Mega brakes and super glue grip and I loved it when I drove it a couple of years ago, I still love it.