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TOYOTA UNVEIL YARIS GR AP4

By Heath McAlpine

Toyota Australia’s latest contender for the Australian Rally Championship has been unveiled based on its new performance model, the Yaris GR.

Built to the New Zealand-devised AP4 regulations by Neal Bates Motorsport, the pair of Yaris GRs for brothers Harry and Lewis Bates will contest the opening round of the ARC next month, the National Capital Rally in the team’s home city of Canberra.

A collaboration between Neal Bates Motorsport and Toyota Australia, it marks the first time the company has actively been involved in the development of rally cars, through development of the bodywork by the Product Planning and Development division.

Toyota Australia and Neal Bates Motorsport’s continued relationship first started more than 30-years ago and has resulted in multiple ARC titles including the 2019 championship won by Harry Bates.

Team owner and four-time ARC champion Neal Bates is excited to reveal the new Yaris AP4, which he believes will continue Toyota’s ARC success.

“This really has been a collaborative effort to help bring these cars to life and we are looking forward to their competition debut next month,” Bates said.

“The design not only gives us a great looking car, but fine tuning the shape of the fenders and bumpers and other body parts using Toyota’s advanced technologies has helped give us an aerodynamic edge.

“We also worked with TOYOTA GAZOO Racing Europe on the 1.6-litre three-cylinder turbo engines, which have been slightly modified from the standard GR Yaris unit to comply with the AP4 regulations, while still delivering extremely quick response and optimum driveability for rallying.”

Thousands of hours have been undertaken to prepare the two Yaris GR AP4s for the new season led by Bates with design director Darryl Bush, son and driver Lewis Bates, Sam Elliot, Chris Shore and Anthony Caldwell from two road cars to leading ARC contenders.

“One of the things that is fantastic about this car is that it was designed for rally conversion and is very low weight to start with,” Bates continued.

“Together with the compact turbo engine and all-wheel drive system, the GR Yaris is a great base car compared to what we have worked with previously to create rally cars.

“Building these rally cars has really demonstrated what’s at the heart of TOYOTA GAZOO Racing – a performance car brand that directly links to real-world motorsport and takes those lessons and technologies and applies them to its road cars.”

New challengers continue to emerge in the ARC from imported R5-spec entries from Ford and Skoda, but the Yaris GR road car base is at an advantage by using aluminium doors and a carbon fibre roof, which remain fitted to the AP4 rally car.

“People often think that a rally car is just a modified road car, but it really is a Supercar for the gravel, the build process is identical to that of a Supercar,” Mr Bates said.

“In a rally car you have to use the standard shell but obviously you modify that quite a bit and a lot of it is about reducing weight.”

The two Yaris GR AP4s come in under the 1230kg minimum weight for the regulations, so ballast will be installed to meet the requirement. Mirrors and bonnets have been 3D printed to minimise weight so too Perspex windows.

The engine used in the Yaris GR AP4 features the stock block, head and inlet manifold, while a turbocharger produces 1.5 bar of boost to meet the regulations enabling power output to be 200kw with 370Nm of torque.

Sadev provides the six-speed sequential gearbox and AWD system featuring a locked centre differential, which splits drive torque evenly 50/50 front-to-rear.

In-house developed and produced suspension componentry adds 50mm to the front tower, with this mated to Murray Coote Australia dampers offering 255mm of travel in the front and 280mm at the rear.

Outside of the engine, transmission, drive-shaft and drive steering rack all components have either been produced by Neal Bates Motorsport or sourced locally in Australia.

Toyota Australia chief marketing officer John Pappas was delighted for the company to be involved in producing the company’s newest rally weapon.

“We have had a very successful relationship with Neal Bates Motorsport and the team ever since Neal first raced for Toyota Team Australia at Bathurst in 1989 and we’re very excited to be unveiling the GR Yaris AP4 – a car designed and built in collaboration with NBM,” Pappas said.

“As a driver Neal has had a very successful career over the past 30 years and now, as TGRA team principal leading the build on these two fantastic GR Yaris AP4 rally cars, we believe he can look forward to more successes.

“We would like to wish the TGRA team all the best for the 2021 ARC season and given the pedigree of the cars, we hope to see Harry and Lewis regularly topping the podium.”

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