Toyota GR86 review

No more. For reasons I’ll come to these really are the end days – and yet those 36 hours in Seville had a timeless quality. I drove two rear-wheel drive sports coupés, both fitted with fizzing combustion engines and manual transmissions, and I howled around a race track and zipped along the kind of remote hillside road you only find on the continent, and I realised this could have been 1972, 2022 or any point in between.

One of those two cars I can’t tell you much about for a little while. It was the revised GR Supra, now offered with a stick and three pedals. The other I can gush about as indecently as I please – it’s the GR86, replacement for the GT86 and without question the finest sub-£40,000 sports car in production today.

I adored it. It was quick enough with its new, bigger engine, better to drive with more sporting tyres and retuned steering, and much more handsome than the old car too. But for now at least, you can’t buy one. The entire UK allocation of around 400 cars has sold out already, and while Toyota GB is doing all it can to pinch a few more cars from other markets to better meet demand on these shores, there’s no guarantee it will manage to do so.

So if you have your eye on the GR86 – starting price £29,995 – and didn’t get one first time around, I suggest you add your name to the waiting list pronto…

That initial batch was spoken for within 90 minutes of order books opening, suggesting once again that car enthusiasts are minded now to enjoy classically configured performance cars while they still can. The allocation was so small because the GR86 will be on sale for only two years, right up until the point that crash safety legislation changes in 2024 and the car – still related to the GT86 that was launched a decade ago – becomes too costly to drag back up to spec.

There are issues with the basic design of the body and its electrical infrastructure too, none of which makes the GR86 deficient from a safety standpoint – merely closer to retirement than graduation.

Whether there is eventually a second allocation or not, the GR86 will always be a rare sight on UK roads ensuring, I believe, that it will become collectible in the fullness of time. If it does, that will be down every bit as much to how wonderful it is to drive as its scarcity.

So how is it different to the GT86, already a Ti favourite? It’s an evolution of that car with a shell that’s stiffer by 50 per cent thanks to additional steel bracing, reworked steering and suspension, plus 18in Michelin Pilot Sport 4 performance tyres rather than low rolling resistance eco rubber (still available elsewhere but not in the UK). The engine has been bored out to 2.4 litres with power raised to 231bhp and torque swelling to 184lb ft, available now from 3700rpm rather than the 151lb ft the old 2-litre engine wheezed out at 6600rpm. There’s a fresher, more modern cabin with standard Apple CarPlay and Android Auto too.

Weight has crept up to between 1276kg and 1316kg depending on specification, thanks mostly to the additional body bracing and extra convenience and safety kit, but offset to some extent by a handful of aluminium rather than steel body panels. The GT86 arrived in 2012 weighing little more than 1200kg, but given the decade and all sorts of new legislation that have passed since then, the weight gain has been pretty minimal.

That’s still lithe for a modern sports car, even if the Mazda MX-5 at under 1100kg at the kerb makes the Toyota appear ever so slightly corpulent. Nonetheless the GR86 is fairly brisk, registering 62mph in 6.3 seconds (more than a second faster than the GT86) and not stopping until 140mph. There is the option of an automatic gearbox, but the standard six-speed manual is preferable. As before, a Torsen limited-slip differential helps put the car’s modest power down to the road.

Of course the engine is still a naturally aspirated flat-four, that configuration favoured even now because it keeps both the centre of gravity and the bonnet line low, aiding handling precision and visibility. Toyota says it has lowered the CoG further still – by 1.6mm, would you believe – and shifted the weight distribution fractionally towards the rear.

As evolutionary as the GR86 may seem, the way it drives would indicate a comprehensive reworking from top to bottom. The basic character that made the GT86 such a willing performer on the right road or circuit remains, but every dynamic attribute has been improved either meaningfully or considerably. It all adds up to a car that’s more fun to drive at speed, but also much more satisfying the rest of the time.

Let’s break that down a little bit. Take the steering, which is no longer springy and elasticated – the GT86’s curious way of steering was always off-putting to me – but now clean, crisp, sharp and perfectly judged. You get through the wheel a much keener sense of the tendencies of the front axle, thanks in part to changes to the electric power steering system but also those more sporting Michelin tyres.

Toyota says it has abandoned the very low-grip philosophy of the old car because customers demanded it, and also because this more powerful model rather called for better rubber. The Pilot Sport 4 tyres add precision and grip but – importantly – not so much of the stuff that the car has suddenly become much less playful at moderate cornering speeds. You can still toy with the GR86’s easy balance at your pleasure.

And toy with it you will, because this car moves from biting into the road surface to gently skating across it so willingly and so progressively, telegraphing to you in very clear terms exactly when it’s going to do so, that you play with it on the limit of adhesion corner after corner, on road or track.

The body rolls a little but the weight feels close to the ground, meaning it flows along a road with composure and grace. Even with two occupants, bags and a tankful of fuel, the GR86 is exquisitely well controlled over crests and undulations. The ride is excellent, too, and the chassis shakes off what few bumps we find on these kitchen worktop Spanish roads like it barely realised they were there.

This is such a faithful and trustworthy car that you drive it on or around the edge of what it can do from the first mile onwards, instantly feeling confident within its low-set driver’s seat. GT86 owners might recognise some of those attributes, but now there is a cohesion about the car, a consistency to its major contact points that means you operate it smoothly, efficiently and with a broad Cheshire Cat grin across your face.

The clutch pedal and gearshift, for instance, are in harmony now. I always found a smooth, slick gearshift in a GT86 took too much conscious effort. Now it’s instinctive, the throw of the manual gearlever just about perfect in its length, weight and feel.

But it’s the engine that’s been transformed. The old 2-litre had a bomb crater in its torque curve and scarcely enough shove to pull any of the three longer ratios with any vigour. More torque means more thrust in the lower gears and at least some response to a flattened throttle pedal in fourth to sixth.

Yet this remains the sort of engine you must wring every drop from, treating 7500rpm not as a limit but a target. Happily, the motor spins out with a crispness and an enthusiasm the old engine wouldn’t recognise. A dash to the redline in a GT86 was often an unrewarding affair as the flat-four coarsely hacked its way through the rev range. This bigger engine now fizzes to the limiter, the high-pitched howling sound it produces being transmitted convincingly to the cabin via a dedicated speaker (in fact this electronic embellishment rather than physical pipe ducting sound from the engine to the cockpit, plus new engine mounts designed to improve refinement, might explain why the bigger engine seems so much more pleasant).

A sweeter motor, more grip and precision in the chassis, improved steering, a finer balance, the same very approachable limits… You would need to spend at least half as much again to have more fun in another sports car on the road.

And on the track? If anything the GR86 is more enjoyable still on circuit, the space and freedom you have there allowing you to lean further into its delicate balance, making the car drift ever so slightly at all four corners through medium speed bends, the steering wheel almost back to centre, so you feel like a Sixties Grand Prix driver, or sliding elegantly under power away from tight corners with a progression and a controllability you won’t find anywhere else at any money. It’ll do so even in the Track driving mode, the at-ease stability control giving you enough freedom to really make the car dance. You can of course stand it down altogether for the most lurid displays of oversteer.

Elsewhere you’ll find strong and resilient brakes, tremendous forward visibility, good lateral support from the seats, pedals that are reasonably well configured for heel-and-toe downshifts and an overall feeling of robustness that suggests the GR86 would stand up to a full day of track driving very gladly indeed.

Drawbacks? The vestigial rear seats are tiny, although they fold flat giving you enough of a stowage compartment to swallow four wheels and tyres. The interior plastics are not exactly soft and plush, but nor should you expect them to be at this money. There is some road noise at speed and if you never really understood the GT86’s modest-power, modest-grip way of doing things I’m not sure the GR86 will convince you otherwise.

But in every other regard this car is a triumph. Far and away the most damning thing I have to report about the GR86 is that if you haven’t been allocated one already, you may not be able to buy one at all.

Toyota GR86
Engine: 2387cc, flat-four
Transmission: 6-speed manual, RWD
Power: 231bhp @ 7000rpm
Torque: 184lb ft @ 3700rpm
Weight: 1276kg
Power-to-weight ratio: 181bhp/tonne
0-62mph: 6.3 seconds
Top speed: 140mph
Price: £29,995
Ti rating: 9/10