With the first ever U.S.-bound round of the all-Japan Grand Touring Championship (JGTC) coming to Fontana, Calif. near the end of this year, you could see this Cusco Racing Subaru Advan Impreza for yourself on American soil. However, when that moment comes, your eyes will surely have overloaded your senses, so now is the time to fill your brain with information. The JGTC is a road racing beer-fed stomachs, mullets, or racing cars with 70's era underppinnings..
The series is divided into two different classes, GT300 and GT500, based primarily on horsepower levels. In GT500 are such heavy hitters as the Supra and the 350Z, and in GT300 are such cars as the MR-S and the #77 Cusco Impreza laid out before you. But don't be fooled by the stock WRX-ish body appearance, what you have and what Cusco Racing has are two different worlds altogether. Although the Impreza has the silhouette of a four-door body, the rear doors are sealed shut and are only for show. The stock strut-type suspension keeps costs down and works for rallying, but is less than optimal for road racing. This Impreza uses double-wishbones all around, not to mention the chopped and formed luncheon meat body and methodically developed aerodynamic work. But the biggest change of all is that this Impreza is two-wheel drive. Yes, that's right, no all-wheel drive system. For the purposes of racing in the JGTC, the Cusco Subaru Advan Impreza utilizes rear-wheel drive, rather than the all-wheel drive technology that propelled the Impreza to numerous WRC titles.
Luckily, for all the voracious Subaru fans out there, the Cusco Impreza still uses the EJ20 horizontally opposed turbocharged 2.0-liter motor, although it is the JDM 2.0-liter turbo and not the 2.0-liter turbo found in U.S.-bound WRXs. Fully prepared by Subaru Tecnica International and serviced by Carrosser Co., LTD, the motor features a 92mm bore and 75mm stroke, 2.0-liter of displacement, and many parts developed for the WRC Impreza rally car effort. However, this engine is not like anything you can build by ordering out of a catalog, (regardless of what you heard your cousin's brother's postman's dog's barber had built). The Impreza's massive cooling system alone is probably worth more than any car we've ever driven here at 2NR. With JGTC rules allowing such modifications, the motor has been moved from its stock location to get better weight distribution and to lower the center of gravity. Helping further is a Cusco dry sump oiling system and a Cusco racing oil pan. As with many racing vehicles, the exact recipe is a secret, but breathing through a mandated 37mm restrictor, the engine makes about 300 hp at 5000 rpm and nearly 290 lb-ft. of torque at 4000 rpm. With a frame weighting only 2535 lb total, don't be fooled by less than sky-high power levels; this thing can move.