Toyota is one of the few high-volume mainstream brands with three or more performance-focused models on the market today. According to one Australian source, that’s all we can expect from the Japanese brand for the foreseeable future. If true it would put an end to speculation about future GR models and potentially increase the value of already-existing ones.
According to Drive, the chief engineer behind the Toyota GR86, Yasunori Suezawa says that the GR86 is the last of the GR Performance cars. Specifically, he’s quoted as saying “There is none left actually, so this [the GR86] is the last.” He evidently specified that he was speaking specifically about the GR Performance line.
“For the GR [performance brand], basically this [the GR86] is the last. But we have a GR Sport [brand] that we will be [widening] with models like the Corolla, Yaris Cross and C-HR,” he said. That would mean that rumors about a number of possible performance projects, including a new MR2 and a GR Corolla sedan would all be false.
Read More: 2023 GR Corolla Clocks 0-60 Time Of 5.4 Sec In First Test, Comes Up Short On Toyota’s Claims
Interestingly enough, it would also indicate that other GR Sport models are still very much in the pipeline. While not widely sold here in the United States, the GR Sport line is basically a sporty appearance package available on a number of Toyota models around the globe.
In addition, it’s unclear whether or not these comments mean that new GR Performance models are done for good or just for the next few model years. If this report ends up being true we expect just about every GR model to rise in value as they’ll be the last of their kind, at least for now. Frankly, we’d be a little surprised to see Toyota abandon the performance segment right as it’s gaining so much traction that it described interest as “humbling”.
It’s very much worth noting that these quotes came through a translator so they may not be exactly what they sound like. Nuance can be easily lost across languages. In addition, while we’ve reached out to Toyota to confirm these details, we have yet to confirm them. We’ll update you if we hear back or learn more.
