With all that out of the way, it doesn’t sound like Subaru has messed with any of the things that made the last BRZ great—namely, the handling. The small, rear-drive sports car will retain a curb weight of less than 2,900 pounds with official preliminary numbers ranging from 2,815 pounds for the manual Premium to 2,881 pounds for the automatic Limited. Just like before, the 2022 BRZ will be available with either a six-speed manual or six-speed automatic with paddle shifters. Automatics now get Subaru’s EyeSight ADAS, as well as a new Sport driving mode that allows for quicker automated downshifts and holds gears for longer when the car’s yaw sensors detect hard cornering.
Despite the slight weight gain (forgivable considering the bigger engine), Subaru says the 2022 BRZ will be the lightest 2+2 rear-wheel-drive production sports car on the U.S. market. What’s more, its center of gravity has been made even lower than that of the old BRZ and is now said to be “on-par with exotic hypercars.”Â
When we asked point-blank whether the new BRZ’s “bespoke chassis” was truly new and not just a modified version of the previous car’s, a Subaru spokesperson said that it was indeed “fully redesigned” as “a collaborative effort with Toyota, like the first generation BRZ.” When probed further, however, the same spokesperson stopped short of calling it a “new platform,” explaining that “the platform is derived from other Subaru products and not the Subaru Global Platform.” Sounds like we’ll have a little longer to wait to find out exactly how much of this car’s skeleton is indeed carried over from the last BRZ.
In any case, its wheelbase grows by 0.2 inches, the overall length is now 0.9 inches longer than before, and the car sits 0.4 inches lower in height while width goes unchanged. Torsional stiffness is up 50 percent while lateral bending rigidity is 60 percent higher.