Subaru BRZ - First Photo Released
The first official photo of Subaru’s version of the Toyota FT-86 – the Subaru BRZ – has been revealed ahead of the Tokyo Motor Show.
We’ve had a raft of images of the Toyota FT-86 in the last week or two, but very little on its Subaru sibling – the Subaru BRZ.
But now, with the Tokyo Motor Show and the official debut of the BRZ (and the FT-86) looming, we have the first photo of the Subaru offering in the Toybaru project.
Developed by Subaru and Toyota – with, it seems, Subaru doing the oily bits and Toyota the styling – the ‘affordable’ sports car from Japan does seem to be a tempting offering.
Subaru has already said that the BRZ will get ‘less than 300bhp’, which we’ve taken to mean ‘something close to 300bhp’. But we have been taken to task by one of our readers who feels that’s just speculation. And he’s right, although Subaru are heading for a fall if the ‘less than 300bhp’ turns out to be the same 200bhp the FT-86 will have.
Still, speculation on the available power in the BRZ aside, we do know that Subaru has said the BRZ will have the lowest centre of gravity of any production car (no, we haven’t checked) which does, with a RWD powertrain, offer the likelihood of a very fun drivers car.
From what we can see on this arse end photo of the BRZ, the Subaru is just a badge-swap job from the FT-86 with, we assume, a new grill bolted on the front to complete the Subaru branding.
There are more difference between this BRZ and the regular FT-86 because this is a photo of the BRZ STI Concept bound for the LA Motor Show, just weeks before the production version debuts at Tokyo. Perhaps it will be the BRZ STI that gets the full-fat 300bhp?
What we do expect (assuming more power in the BRZ than the FT-86) is a price point nudging £30k. The plan always was for the FT-86 to arrive at £20k, but that seems unlikely. Much more likely is that the FT-86 will be £25k with the BRZ at £30k.
But we’ll find out soon enough.
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