There’s no denying the Toyota GR Yaris is one of the purest cars on the market today. Yes, you can’t buy it if you live in the United States but for those of you living on the other side of the pond, we envy you because this is essentially a rally car for the road. And we like raw sports cars.
Of course, that fact doesn’t necessarily mean the car is fast in all kinds of tests. While absolutely awesome, the six-speed manual gearbox doesn’t exactly help in off-the-line sprints, for example. In addition, there’s no launch control.
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But with a mix of low weight (1,280 kilograms/2,822 pounds), high power (257 horsepower), and an all-wheel-drive system, the GR Yaris definitely seems like a proper hot hatch. On paper, it should be capable of hitting 62 miles per hour (100 kilometers per hour) from a standstill in about five seconds. The top speed is electronically capped at 143 mph (230 kph).
But how does it perform in the real world? Carwow was looking to get some answers when Mat Watson got the GR Yaris for a test. In the video above, you can check out his entire review of the pocket rocket but we want to focus on the moment when he tries to reproduce the factory 0-62 mph (0-100 kph) numbers.
In fact, his gadgets are tuned to record the 0-60 mph (0-96 kph) acceleration time. And the numbers, while not completely matching what Toyota says, are good – 5.31 seconds. Yes, we know there are way faster cars but keep in mind this one has a three-cylinder engine, a manual gearbox, and no launch control.
Can you name a better small hot hatch? The comments section below is all yours. We can wait.
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