Toyota GR Yaris

More wheel-time in the GR solidifies the editor’s ecoty verdict

IT’S A RISKY BUSINESS NAILING YOUR colours to the mast during ecoty when it’s the first time you’ve driven a particular car, but you don’t get to the lofty position of attending endless meetings and signing off Aston Parrott’s coffee expenses if you’re not prepared to take a punt. Which is why I put the GR Yaris top of my ecoty list. Two weeks on road and track left me smitten and bitten by the Toyota’s infectious enthusiasm and ability to put a grin on the most miserable of faces (mine) with every drive.

And that enthusiasm didn’t waiver when managing editor Ian Eveleigh ran out of excuses and finally relinquished his grip on the GR’S key in a snow-swept car park on the outskirts of St Neots (lockdown glamour at its finest). The Yaris was mine for a month and the weather was predicted to be foul. Excellent.

Away from the adrenaline of ecoty the GR instantly proved it was no show pony. Its thrummy three-pot coasts along without needing to sit at the red line, there’s plenty of mid-range torque to make progress when you’re not in the mood to call your own imaginary pace notes, and the six-speed manual has an instinctive shift that removes all hesitation from the process of sprinting through the gears. It doesn’t matter if the journey is 20 miles or 200, the little Toyota isn’t fazed by a single thing.

Snow, ice and salted and gritted roads provided the perfect playgr… er, testing conditions on which to experience more of the GR’S dynamics. As with many cars, the habit is to immediately put it in Sport mode. Here that sends 70 per cent of the torque to the rear wheels, resulting in some rather delicious angles when you get on the power once the nose is hooked up, driving the Yaris out of the corner with a delicate angle of slip. And all at sane speeds: another feather in the Toyota’s cap is you don’t need to be called Seb and paid to wear a branded beanie hat to enjoy it.

It’s for this reason I stay away from Track mode. It splits torque 50:50, and being from the dark ages the thought of actively sending less torque to the rear axle doesn’t compute. It makes for a sharper front end, the Torsen diff on our Circuit Pack equipped car working the front Michelins harder and reducing some of the looseness that others don’t like, although it’s still no Mitsu Evo in this regard. But it also robs you of that more agile and more playful rear, which on the road appeals to me more than turning the car into a laser-guided missile.

On a more practical note, my (taller) colleagues have criticised the high seating position, and even being a sub-six footer it’s too high for my preferred driving position, but crucially not uncomfortably so. The large interior mirror also doesn’t obstruct my view forward as it does for others. Said mirror is often of little use, though, because with no rear wiper and a fairly square rump, the GR’S rear window quickly gains a layer of grime, making for a very cool straightoff-the-rally-stage look but zero rear visibility.

So 28 days later am I still smitten by the GR Yaris? More than ever.

Date acquired December 2020 Total mileage 2859 Mileage this monh 601 Costs this monh £0 mpg this month 25.1