Toyota confirms GTI-rivalling hot hatch

WRC-spec Yaris to spawn road-going performance car.

14 December 2016 David McCowen

Toyota will build a Yaris hot hatch following its WRC experience. Photo: Supplied

Toyota has declared its intention to take on the hot hatch establishment with a high-performance version of its Yaris hatchback.

The brand surprised onlookers at the presentation of its new Yaris World Rally Championship contender by confirming plans to take on compact performance cars such as the Ford Fiesta ST and Volkswagen Polo GTI.

A brief statement published on the brand's European website confirms Toyota's "return to the hot hatch market" as part of its WRC tilt.

The brand returns to rallying in 2017. Photo: Supplied

"Not only will the WRC scene provide learnings to further improve Toyota's road car technology, it will also inspire an expansion of the Yaris line-up with a performance oriented version," Toyota says.

The move represents a new direction for Toyota, which has a tradition of offering dedicated sports cars such as the 86, MR2 and Supra rather than hotted-up versions of regular models in a similar fashion to Volkswagen's Golf GTI.

The brand's head of sports car development, Tetsuya Tada, told Drive in 2015 that "we need a real hot hatch for the Toyota brand".

Toyota has not revealed technical details for the model. Likely to feature a turbocharged engine, it could use a development of the 2.0-litre turbo motor that offers 180kW when fitted to the Lexus IS200t sedan.

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Drive Comments

4 Comments

ibstltr | 2016-12-15 01:36:51

>which has a tradition of offering dedicated sports cars such as the 86, MR2 and Supra rather than hotted-up versions of regular models Not correct. Toyota have offered modified versions of their Corolla, Yaris and so on in the past - but mostly in JDM form only. Examples would be the Glanza, the infamous AE86 for the Corolla as well as the mid-90s silver-top variants plus GT4 (4wd wagon), the Altezza RS200 (Lexus IS200), and so on.

Vichet Kim | 2016-12-15 03:21:15

The problem with the turbo engine in the IS200t sedan is the turbo lag. Toyota needs to do something about this issue if they want to be taken seriously although VW's diesel emission debacle will give the Yaris on steroids an early head start even with any turbo lag issues.