I don’t believe I’m writing this, but the facts are that one of the most exciting cars to hit the world performance car market in recent times is the Toyota Yaris …….
To be specific it’s the Toyota GR Yaris and in particular the GR Yaris Rallye Edition which is fitted with the world’s most powerful three-cylinder production engine, the turbocharged 200kW/370Nm all-wheel drive rocket ship.
When it was first put on sale here in Australia in late 2020, the first batch of 1,000 Yaris’s were sold in under a week. Although Toyota promised they would deliver another 2,000 cars by the end of 2021, in July of that year they were only able to deliver 1,700 cars and so they announced that they were putting a temporary halt on future orders as it struggled to secure enough stock of the internationally in-demand car.
Such is the demand for Toyota’s GR branded cars, which stands for Gazoo Racing and is the performance arm of Toyota.
It’s interesting that in June 2009 Toyota Motor Corporation announced that its new President would be Akio Toyoda (a grandson of Toyota’s founder) a man who has a love of motor racing and was the man who not only signed off on the GR Yaris project but was also a test driver for it.
Toyoda is an accomplished driver and using his racing pseudonym of Morizo Konoshita, has competed in events like the 2009 24 Hour Nurburgring, and reaching 87th position overall and the fourth in his class with his LF-A Prototype
During the development of the GR Yaris, Toyoda (driving as Morizo) crashed the first test car during a mid-winter test drive and after exiting the car on his own, remarked that he didn’t “like the feel of it”. As Morizo, Toyoda continued to drive development prototypes of the GR Yaris, and since the car’s release, has campaigned the car in races.
So, it’s not surprising that he not only signed off on the soon to be released GR Corolla, but also has put his name to the two-seater race ready Morizo Edition of the car, and this is the one that people are eagerly awaiting.
On top of the already capable five-seat version of the GR Corolla with its 220kW/370Nm 1.6-litre turbo-petrol three-cylinder engine with All Wheel Drive set up, which is expected to be seen in Australia later this year, the Toyota GR Corolla ‘two-seater’ Morizo Edition features revised suspension, upgraded tyres, more engine torque and body reinforcements to improve its dynamic performance.
As to be expected, the GR Corolla’s aren’t going to be cheap with the five-seater expected to cost around $60k and the two-seater Morizo Edition around $70k, but one could argue that on paper and following the success of the GR Yaris, both these cars will deliver great bang for your bucks.
carsales.com.au – Feann Torr looks at the GR Corolla Morizo Edition in the following review, and also check out the “Story of the GR Corolla” promo video featuring Toyota Motor Corporation President Akio Toyoda towards the end of the article. It looks like a great little performance car’