New Toyota CEO hints that there is a future for GR performance

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Toyota’s newly appointed president, Koji Sato, has told UK media that the future of Toyota will include the performance-focused Gazoo Racing brand. 

Speaking with Autocar, Sato said that Akio Toyoda, his predecessor and Toyota’s master driver, could be working on more GR products moving forward as chairman. 

“Now he is only chairman, maybe he will have a lot more time to develop cars for them?” Sato said.

“The Gazoo [Racing] brand will be acknowledged for the future and maybe we can even speed it up,” Sato said. 

While this is far from a confirmation of any future product, it is understood that the GR brand will certainly live on even in the electric era. 

GR sports car with LFA-like styling likely to be in development

When Toyota announced its electrified concept lineup, one car that stood out from the crowd was the GR sports car concept. 

With clear styling influences from the Lexus LFA supercar, there has been little word on this future sports car as a production model, but if GR remains in Toyota’s grand plans, we will almost certainly see a finished product in the next five years or so. 

Information on powertrain and performance is still very much under wraps, however we could see a rear-drive or all-wheel-drive electric setup in time. 

A quick recap on Toyota GR 

In Australia, there are currently four full-blown GR products for sale: the GR Yaris, the GR Corolla, the GR86 and the GR Supra. 

But there is also a range of GR Sport branded products, too, with Toyota throwing the badge onto its Land Cruiser 300 Series, the C-HR, Yaris Cross, and in 2023, the Hilux. 

We’ve done a great explainer piece on the differences between the GR grades previously on Chasing Cars that you can find here. 

Toyota Gazoo Racing was introduced in 2007 as the motorsport division of Toyota. While the name is now widely known for its production models, on the motorsport side of things, Toyota’s Gazoo Racing division also competes in the World Rally Championship and the World Endurance Championship.