Introducing Honorable Mentions. Cars that I haven’t owned, but feel strongly enough to write forever for.
We all have our preferences.
For me that means a lightweight, rear-wheel drive, balanced, naturally aspirated roadster or coupe. Over time my ownership experiences have narrowed down what I desire in a car. However, there’s an infinite variance in taste out there, so inevitably people I’ve befriended have preferences different from my own.
Enter the 2006 Subaru Impreza WRX STi (GD chassis)
The owner of this car and I went to the same high school, becoming friends a couple years after graduating. At that point he was rolling in a 2008 Toyota Corolla S (yay?) with an automatic (umm?). But he was aware that I was a fellow car nut, and was interested in learning how to drive a manual transmission.
We were at a mutual friend’s place when he asked to take my three pedal Volvo around the block. I don’t recall what was on my mind, but I didn’t think twice about tossing him the keys. Half an hour later, I got a call from him.
“Uhhhh….I’m trying to make a three point turn. How do you put it in reverse?”
Years later he sprung for his dream car. A brief stint in a GC chassis Impreza 2.5RS was truncated by a wily deer. Rather than hunt for another GC that wasn’t completely thrashed, he decided to skip straight to a GD STi.
300hp from a turbo-charged 2.5L flat four, full-time symmetrical all wheel drive, a switchable center differential, four doors, and a curb weight just over 3300lbs. None of these attributes match my base preferences, but his draw to this rally rocket had been distilled differently from mine.
As opposed to messing around and sampling cars until he found what he liked, he relied on his pre-license inspirations. Childhood was spent watching Subaru, the Prodrive team, and a certain Scotsman hurl the iconic 555 Impreza to victories in the World Rally Championship (WRC), planting the seed of desire for the funny sounding Japanese sedan painted blue and paired with gold wheels.
Obviously the first generation Impreza WRX STi is a much different beast to what came to his possession, but with them never having come to the US, pursuit of the next best thing narrowed the search to the ’06 you see here. While I could appreciate his acquisition of a high performance car, my initial judgements were not positive. It felt heavy, the electronic throttle was half asleep, the engine was laggy, and like a reverse Porsche 911 it never let you forget the engine was hung past the front axle.
I didn’t get it. I had fun blowing away the occasional pony car on the highway, and while I thought the car was too big, I enjoyed its aesthetic as a whole. Compared to my modified Miata though, the steering was numb, the handling ponderous, and the shift rods may as well have been a mile long for their lack of precision.
Then I drove it in the rain.
We were cruising backroads in a torrential downpour with me at the helm, when we happened upon a 1st-gen Subaru Legacy Turbo. Significance? The 1st generation Legacy Turbo was the first car Prodrive developed for Subaru to run in WRC, the first Subaru Colin McRae piloted in anger, and the last force-fed Subaru the US Market got until the “Bug Eye” Impreza WRX in 2002. We shortened the gap to take a look at this somewhat rare car, its open exhaust loud enough to penetrate our closed windows.
Then the road turned twisty.
The Legacy Turbo was lightly modified and well driven, showing a pace uncovering the allure of these cars. The STi’s brake pedal is firm, and the ABS usable rather than harsh. The chassis begs for trail-braking for maximum turn in. The steering is quick, and in the rain gives an amazing amount of feedback as the front tires scrabble for grip. And speaking of scrabbling, the turbo motor forces you to plan your throttle inputs, and once on boost it rushes through the midrange, enabling unreal corner exits even off the most slippery sections.
The car came alive for me that afternoon. After playing Cat & Mouse for a few miles it would have been nice to chat with the Legacy driver, but when the road hit town they drove off into the sunset. My friend and I decided our AWD exchange was interaction enough.
I’ll repeat this here like others do elsewhere: Variety is the spice of life. Many understand the concept, yet stop short of applying it to cars. We all like what we like. Maybe your parents instilled brand loyalty from a young age, maybe your first car seemed like the best and you bought the same kind every time thereafter. Perhaps your favorite race car driver ran a silhouette of the street car your cousin owned, or you spent all your Gran Turismo credits on that one vehicle that performed the best.
That should not prevent you from keeping an open mind. We all have our preferences, but going outside of those won’t weaken them. There seems to be a fear that venturing outside what you know would break the core of what makes one an enthusiast, but that isn’t the case. Exploring disciplines different from your own may even strengthen your understanding of why you’re drawn to what you are. But you’ll do yourself a disservice avoiding experiencing the diversity in our little space.
That experience following another Subaru enthusiast in the right conditions brought the point home for me. I still prefer small roadsters with naturally aspirated engines and rear driven wheels, but whenever the skies begin to pour I take a glance at the hills and think about everything out there I’ve yet to drive. I suspect there’s exploration left for all of us.
Have you ever tried a car that was the polar opposite of your taste? Share below!