We got our first look at the upcoming Subieyota earlier today. Now, Subaru's released more photos of the Subaru BRZ STI concept headed to the LA Auto Show. Will it be all we hope it will be? All signs point to yes.
One thing to note: The sheetmetal for the production Subaru BRZ (which will be revealed at the Tokyo Motor Show later this month) won't look exactly like this — apparently Subaru has replaced every piece of bodywork for show-car dazzle purposes.
Still, there's every reason to believe that both the Toyobaru and Subieyota versions of this 2,600-pound, boxer-engined sports coupe will be everything we've been hoping for. A car that, like the Mazda Miata, is a purpose-built handler — a pure sports car uncompromised by it having to share a chassis with mom's own hauler of garden-sale begonias.
We're imagining a car with a holistically designed engine and chassis combination, requiring little in the way of out-the-door triage tuning to make it a one-G-machine on the skidpad. A car whose wheels and tires are sized and chosen for turn-in, not head-turns.
A car that, although likely leaving the factory with some prophylactic understeer dialed in, will have exactly as much power as the underpinnings can handle, and not a single horsepower more. Within reason, of course.
If it seems like we've invested our hopes and dreams in the BRZ and its Scion FR-S counterpart, it's because we have. A $25,000 car whose performance benchmark is the Porsche Cayman? Yes, please.