MotorTrend Blog: BRZ handling "better than Porsche, Godzilla and the McLaren"
 

http://blogs.motortrend.com/the-week...ast-22121.html

I wasn't expecting to see anything in this article that would have been worth posting; however, the one quick paragraph mentioning the BRZ is impressive. I know that we've heard how great this car is/going to be, but look what was said:

“How was it Kim?” When I can, I always make it a point to debrief our testing director and handling/ride quality guru Kim Reynolds whenever he climbs out of a car that’s just been figure eighted. Not only is everything fresh in his mind, but there’s no editing whatsoever. Also, Kim hates it when I quote him and I like upsetting Kim. “It’s just… fantastic.” He went on to say that the 2013 Subaru BRZ, Subaru’s new RWD sports coupe, handled better than the $178,000+ Porsche, Godzilla and the McLaren he’d put around our figure eight hours earlier.

That's some crazy praise if you ask me compared to the price of the others! :party0030:

Now that is what I like to hear - pretty amazing! There is yet more goodness in the blog, so check it out.

ALRIGHT ALRIGHT ALRIGHT!

That's because the BRZ is the Scooty Puff Jr. of the car world (in a good way). Just enough power to be fun, and not enough to be dangerous.

Let's have safe fun!

Even though it's a very subjective statement, that certainly is some fantastic praise! Now if only everyone can afford to drive cars in the same way car journalists thrash them... :)

We know it can handle fairly well but is it faster then a FRS :popcorn:

yesterday its losing comparos to the 370 and miata today its beating vipers and porsches...i wish the media would make up their mind

Not according to that Japanese track comparison - it's a wee bit slower due to its inherent (although very mild) understeer.

The media isn't in business of making up their minds ;)

The truth is surely somewhere between this blurb and evo's thrashing.

They are. It is all just a bunch of IMHOs, so it stands to reason those opinions will differ.

Enjoy reading the pieces, take them with a grain of salt, and wait for the next one... especially GT86/FRS ones now that Subaru has seemingly got theirs out of the way.

Edit: dsgerbc beat me to the post there, what he says too :-)

I guess it's very important to the Japanese that this car can beat Godzilla...

wow just the title alone saying better handling then the "Godzilla" pretty impressive!!! NOW GIVE ME THE CAR ALREADY SUBARU!!!!!

I think this sums up the opinions most will have.

You guys realize that the automotive media has it in their best interest to hype to cars right?

It's all a conspiracy. No one is allowed to like driving anything ever. :rolleyes:

Getting more and more pumped up by the minute over here....

lol Im just saying take it with a grain of salt.

In general they hype new cars, it sells magazines and a healthy car market helps their subscription base. If people weren't excited about the car industry they wouldn't be in busines. This car in particular checks all the boxes they as enthusiasts love, but I don't buy that its better than Cayman. Maybe a better drivers car than a GTR, but that car is all about lap times to an absurd point.... even that statement is hard for me to write and not smirk.

edit: also its not a conspiracy. Its just how businesses are run. A good employee in a company is usually someone who is excited and positive about the business they are in. It's just the nature of business to make those kind of people the face of your company... which in many ways journalist are in this business.

Remember the context, the figure 8 test. Two skidpads with a transition from one direction to the other. Completely not surprised that it beat a 2 ton GT-R.

Edit:
It didn't beat the GT-R, the editor just said it handled better. Bit on the GT-R says it was third fastest they ever tested on the figure 8.

Cool, glad to see I wasn't the only one smirking after reading that post! :D Not much longer fella's and we'll have our go! :happyanim:

Indeed and a key 'real world' benchmark for those of us who spend hours driving continually around the same cloverleaf highway exit for kicks :lol:

Gotta love those magazine tests.

They don't. If they hyped every car like this nobody would take them seriously.

Critical information. (See my location in profile. Heh...)

^LOL!

I promise people we have never met before and this wasn't a set up ;-)

They don't hype every car, but they do hype in general. Like I said before this car check all the boxes on their enthusiast hypometer. It is the car to be excited about this year.

Im not saying the car is shit... I have an order in for one. Im just saying take what most auto journalists have to say with a grain of salt. I've read too many times about cars considered to be perfect by them, only to have to greatly criticizing the cars flaws a few years down the line when the new competitor comes out.

Good job

have an internet and a lolcat

http://www.toptenreviews.com/i/rev/s...eezburger2.jpg

Pretty cool it handles like an $50k+ car tho

Yup.

The more of these I read, the more I feel that they actually left a significant amount of handling for proper tires and suspension tuning to unlock.

Some potential for epic handling.

I've driven some pretty fast cars but the problem I find is that they are either a little too heavy or too big. They are designed to be stable at 150 mph, not to be whipped around little corners at 30 mph. So yeah, to some extent I believe them that the BRZ handles better. However, they probably could have said the same for other similar cars.

Yeah that's the problem with a lot of performance cars.

I know which of the two attributes I want.

Has it ever been proved that there are auto journalists and/or auto magazines who get paid by car manufacturers to give praise to their new vehicles? I wouldn't be surprised if this were the case because it would explain why I never see a journalist write completely terrible things about a car. If they ever did, then they'd stop getting kick backs from the auto manufacturer. :)

Chris Harris did write something terrible about Ferrari.

Subaru and Toyota are going to be broke with all those payouts then!

Good thing rear tires are the same as the front....so if the rear goes bald after a good thrashing in the track, then just switch the front with the rear, and you're good to go again for more power sliding fun!

The media is hyping it up waaaay too much. I'm just gonna wait for the Top Gear UK review. Hopefully, Jeremy will shed some light into this. Although, Top Gear UK has already had first drive impressions of this car and they like it a lot! End of June is the likely showing of the new series.

Actually this is a good point for my case... As he will never be invited to test a new Ferrari ever again.

It just shows that what he said was right. :thumbsup:

Which Ferrari was it?

All of them. He basically said they give reviewers obviously tuned from stock cars to get better reviews. It was on jalopnik and is a good read.

All of them. Ferrari is apparently very selective and controlling with their 'production' cars. Has been since the 80's if I remember an article about the 'US-spec' Quattrovalvo that C&D tested. The 'production' car that Ferrari supplied was almost a second faster in the 1/4 mile and like almost .1g better on the skidpad than a real one sourced from an American dealer. The Harris article goes into how Ferrari controls the 'independant' testing by providing specific cars for specific tests. They don't take one car and do all testing on it. They take the car that Ferrari tells them for a specific test.

They don't allow mags to borrow cars from owners for the test either. Every about the test is controlled by Ferrari themselves. They don't let mag publish any comparison test that Ferrari came out the worst or close to the worst. In short, the Ferrari cars tested by Mags, is not the same spec as what's at the dealership.