2021 Toyota GR Yaris Rallye performance testing

If you have a single bone of mechanical sympathy in your body, then performance testing manual, all-wheel drive cars like the Toyota GR Yaris Rallye is one of the least enjoyable jobs you can imagine.

With so much grip to overcome there really is only one way to successfully launch them, but before that let’s run a set of numbers – 0-60mph (97km/h), 0-100km/h and 0-400m – in a more sedate manner as a benchmark.

Dialling up around 2500rpm and letting the clutch out gradually gets the Yaris GR rolling but the revs die and the 200W/370Nm 1.6-litre turbocharged three-cylinder takes a moment to spool up and get going.

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As expected, the numbers are pretty pants, with 0-100km/h taking 6.5sec – an eon away from the 5.2sec claim – and a 14.4sec quarter mile. For all runs Sport mode was selected for a 30:70 front-to-rear drive split and the ESP was deactivated.

For the next run the traditional technique is employed: namely, dial up as many revs as possible then dump the clutch. The GR Yaris seems to have a protection mode built in if you bang it off the limiter, cutting power when you release the clutch, so instead you have to floor the throttle and then release the clutch as revs build.

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It’s a brutal process, but all four wheels spin briefly, the fronts axle tramping up the strip, but the launch is wasted when I miss the shift to third. Even so the times improve to 6.1sec 0-100km/h and a 13.8sec quarter mile.

The GR Yaris does have a handicap when it comes to setting quick 0-100km/h times. Second gear runs to 98km/h, which means the 0-60mph time can be recorded with only one gear change, but no matter what you do, you’re going to have to shift to third before 100km/h.

One way around this issue is to hold second for as long as possible so that by the time you’ve dipped the clutch, momentum has carried you through the 100km/h mark without needing to complete the time-consuming two-three shift.

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With all this in place, progress is made. The third run nets 0-60mph in 5.1sec, 0-100km/h in 5.3sec and a 13.4sec quarter mile at 168km/h. On the return run down the strip 80-120km/h is completed in 3.1sec in third gear and stopping from 100km/h takes an impressively short 35.6m.

A sign of the punishment being inflicted on the Yaris is that an “AWD system overheated” message flashes up on the instrument display, a sign that the car needs a rest for a few minutes before attempting another launch. Ignore if and the Yaris GR reverts to front-wheel drive.

One last run nets a small gain, the 60mph time falling to 5.04sec, the 0-100km/h time 5.29sec and the 400m figure 13.32sec at 169.2km/h. But wait, there’s more.

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Another attempt while filming external footage for the attached video nails it, the GR Yaris leaping from 0-60mph in 4.89sec, flashing through 100km/h in 5.14sec – besting the claim by 0.06sec – and taking just 13.19sec at 169.76km/h. This is one fast three-cylinder!

Toyota GR Yaris Rallye performance data