It’s more than a decade since Subaru quit the World Rally Championship, but still the Japanese carmaker is a regular on every round of the series. And still in huge numbers.
It was the same in Monte Carlo and Sweden. Croatia was ridiculous, Portugal the same. I defy you to walk down a line of parked spectator cars and not pick out at least 10 Imprezas. Granted, a few of them might be looking a little past their best, but dog-eared or not, they still sound the same.
Turn the key and watch the world smile.
And we have one company to thank for that. Prodrive. Were it not for the determination and imagination of Davids Richards and Lapworth, fans around the world would be without the wheels of fever they cherish today, like today was yesterday and yesterday was the middle of the 1990s.
All of which makes Prodrive’s decision to mark 25 years since the inception of its Impreza WRC97 – a car which won on its debut at the hands of Piero Liatti in Monte Carlo – such good news.
The Prodrive P25 will be created taking inspiration from the 22B, the fastest road-going Impreza and definitely the one which offered the nearest thing to driving a World Rally Car on the road (apart from the P1, which was a bit of a beast as well).
Predictably, the P25 is an Impreza with a carbon fibre flavor and a good bit more grunt. The 2.5-liter boxer engine will generate more than 400bhp and be mated to a six-speed semi-automatic gearbox and lightweight chassis.
And, just like old times, the styling has been overseen by Peter Stevens, while Lapworth has engineered this piece of history.
Just 25 will be made, with the first public outing coming at Goodwood’s Festival of Speed next month. Sadly, the rarety means the P25 is unlikely to be lining up alongside two and three decade old STIs and WRXs on the spectator access roads at a WRC round near you.
Richards said: “The original 22B Impreza is considered the most iconic of Subarus and highly sought after. We wanted to enhance everything that made that car so special by applying the very latest technology to create our own modern interpretation of a car that’s established a place in motoring history.”
