Rumors have been fly­ing about a new per­for­mance ori­ented Toy­ota sports car hit­ting the per­for­mance scene for a con­sid­er­able time now, from an AE86 revival to a new Supra, but per­haps no one expected news that these shad­owy rumors would coa­lesce into the for­got­ten Cel­ica GT-​​4.

The last model Cel­ica. Will we see styling cues from this?

But per­haps even more sur­pris­ing is the rumor that the car will be engi­neered to a large degree by Sub­aru. In Novem­ber Toy­ota con­firmed rumours of a new sports car and Cel­ica replace­ment, with the sports car being a col­lab­o­ra­tion between Sub­aru and Toy­ota, and now it seems the car is the per­for­mance model of the Cel­ica line. How­ever, the new car will not come with a Toy­ota bred turbo four in the tra­di­tion of the (some­what) under­pow­ered motor of the old model — instead it’s going to be car­ry­ing a Sub­aru Boxer turbo, most recently seen in the all grown up Sub­aru Impreza WRX STi.

The new model is said to come in two dis­tinct per­for­mance vari­ants. First, the base ‘GT’, pack­ing a front engined, RWD dri­ve­train and nat­u­rally aspi­rated 2.0L 4 cylin­der Boxer (most likely from the Impreza RX), designed to slide in under the $20,000 bracket. Sec­ondly the full fat GT-​​4, which car­ries the new JDM STi’s 224KW (300HP) Boxer turbo and AWD sys­tem stan­dard, with Motor Trend claim­ing the engine will be closer to the cars fire­wall in order to facil­i­tate the instal­la­tion of in-​​wheel elec­tric motors to help with traction.

The GT and GT-​​4 will be built in in coupe and three-​​door hatch vari­ants, but no five door vari­ants because of Toy­ota and Sub­aru not want­ing to com­pete in the Impreza’s arena, which is rather tongue in cheek con­sid­er­ing this new car will inevitably be seen as either a Impreza in Toy­ota cloth­ing, or as direct com­pe­ti­tion by tuners. This begs the ques­tion then; will the new GT-​​4 be a real con­tender in the hotly con­tested price for per­for­mance bracket? Will the Toy­ota be lighter, faster, and more capa­ble than the new STi? Would Sub­aru shoot them­selves in the foot, and does it mat­ter con­sid­er­ing Toyota’s widen­ing stake in Sub­aru?

Does this mean Sub­aru will become more and more the per­for­mance arm of Toy­ota? Time will tell, but we cer­tainly hope not.

‘Nuff said. Per­haps the hottest EVO ever pro­duced by Mitsubishi:

[Source:� Rock­et­Pun­chAu­to­Blog]

The new Evo­lu­tion X has been made offi­cial in a new press release from Mit­subishi, with cars hit­ting deal­ers in Japan today, Octo­ber 1st, 2007.

Here’s a quick run­down of the juici­est fea­tures on the new Evo­lu­tion X

• Engine
  • New, com­pletely redesigned alu­minium block ‘4B11’ 16-​​valve, 2.0L DOHC MIVEC inter­cooled tur­bocharged engine — 12kg lighter than the out­go­ing 4G63.
  • Power: 295HP, Torque: 422 Nm @ 3500rpm (300 lb-​​ft)
• Two trim lev­els: RS, GSR.

• Trans­mis­sions:
  • Twin Clutch SST 6-​​speed auto­mated man­ual on the GSR or
  • 5 speed man­ual also avail­able on the GSR
  • 5 speed man­ual on the RS only (No SST)

• 4WD S-​​AWC (Super All Wheel Con­trol) on the GSR
  • ACD (Active Cen­ter Differential)
  • AYC (Active Yaw Control)
  • Sport ABS (Sport Anti-​​lock Brake System)
  • Active Sta­bil­ity Con­trol (ASC)
• Suspension/​ Tyre /​ Brakes
  • MacPher­son strut front and multi-​​link rear suspension
  • (GSR) 18-​​inch Enkei 12-​​spoke high-​​rigidity cast alloy wheels. 18-​​inch BBS light­weight alloy wheels are also avail­able as a factory-​​fitted option
  • GSR comes stan­dard with Brembo 18-​​inch front and 17-​​inch rear ven­ti­lated disc brakes. (Unsure if this is a mis­take. Though that’s what’s stated on the PR! — ED )
  • Bil­stein sin­gle tube shock absorbers and Eibach coil springs

• Inte­rior
  • Pre­mium Rock­ford Fos­gate audio, factory-​​fitted MMCS option with 30Gb hard disk drive audio/​navigation sys­tem and 7-​​inch LCD screen on the GSR.
  • Recaro seats
  • Var­i­ous inte­rior upgrade option pack­ages, includ­ing leather
  • High con­trast instru­ment cluster
  • Leather wrapped steer­ing with audio controls
• Pric­ing:
  • GSR: 3,750,600 yen with 6speed Twin Clutch SST
  • GSR: 3,495,450 yen 5 speed M/​T
  • RS: 2,997,750 yen with 5 speed

And of course, required read­ing — the Press Release itself . This car has tonnes more fea­tures, admit­tedly more than we expected. The Impreza WRX STi has a bat­tle ahead of it with the new Evo.