Probably the last popular sports car with a rotary engine without a turbo to heat it up on the Autobahn, it inspires desire

In its previous generation, it was a somewhat underpowered alternative, today it is something of the last Mohican. And before the last Mohican, you don’t ask if you even want it. But whether someone will sell it to you is another question.

It’s sad to admit it, but after 30 years of living on a more or less free market, at least in the case of cars, we are gradually returning to the Mototechna/Tuzex model, when on paper “everything is there”, but somehow you can’t buy it. Car companies still produce basically anything you can think of, but the unification forced by the often absolutely senseless regulations of the European Union has caused a lot of once completely normal things to become something exclusive. And it’s extremely expensive or, realistically, completely unavailable.

One such car is the Toyota GR86. It’s essentially the last popular sports car to offer you a torquey naturally aspirated engine without a turbo, rear-wheel drive and a manual transmission. It’s a Porsche 911 GT3 (well, with all eyes convulsively closed) for the poor, which, according to Toyota’s price list, starts at 950,000 crowns. Eureka! Actually, no, in the same price list it says “temporarily sold out”. And if you ask the dealer when this temporary state will end, you will get the answer after about a minute of laughter from the entire showroom staff. The specific answer is then quite irrelevant.

The deliveries of this car – like many others – are artificially limited due to CO2 emissions. GR86 simply is and is not. It’s on paper, it’s not in reality. The car emits around 200 grams of CO2 per km, which means that it goes on sale with a price burden of 105 (over-limit emissions) times 95 Euros (fine for each gram over the limits), i.e. 9,975 Euros (about 241 thousand CZK) in the form of a fine paid EU for every car sold. And you know that Toyota will think about how many such cars it will deliver to Europe, when it comes to a car for 785,000 CZK without VAT, and that fine would therefore make up 31 percent of the price. This is how it destroys the market and makes an exclusive thing out of what was once actually quite an embarrassing car.

The new GR86 is no longer so embarrassing, it got a better engine, a 2.4-liter atmospheric four-cylinder with 234 horses, weighs only 1,275 kilos, covers 100 km/h in 6.3 seconds and is supposed to accelerate to 226 km/h. All this still with a six-speed manual under the right hand. And it really does, as you can see in the video shot on a speed-limitless German autobahn below. True, the interior of the car looks like a VW Caddy, and overall it’s simply a Toyota – cost-reduced car ad infinitum with electronics like from the last decade, but thanks to that, it lasts. And when you play with her on your favorite circuit, you won’t care about everything else. Now just where and how to buy it. Among the used cars offered in the Czech Republic, you will find exactly 0 cars, but there are a few cars in Germany.

The Toyota GR86 is an almost unbelievable car today, it doesn’t go bad either, as you can see below. It costs basically a fortune, but it is difficult to actually buy it. Photo: Toyota

Source: @YouTube

Petr Miler

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