Better late than never, the Toyota Supra has finally been spied testing in the hotter GRMN guise. The “Gazoo Racing Masters of the Nürburgring” variant was caught on its “home turf” at the Green Hell undergoing testing with minimal camouflage. Most (if not all) of the disguise is pretty pointless since the wing is easy to see, and it appears to be derived from the rear aero piece installed on the 45th Anniversary Edition.
At the front, those canards on the extremities of the bumper are hard to miss, and so is the spoiler lip. Moving to the profile, this prototype rides extremely low to the ground courtesy of a stiffer suspension setup. The Supra GRMN boasts new, presumably lightweight wheels with beefier brakes featuring red calipers. We’d reckon this is not how the production version will look since Toyota is likely going to make changes to the bumpers as well.
The biggest modification is expected to take place underneath the hood where it could finally receive an M engine. The regular Supra versions are offered with the 2.0-liter B48 and 3.0-liter B58 engines from BMW’s performance division. Perhaps the folks from Munich will allow Toyota to use the S58 powering the M2, M3, and M4 models along with the X3 M and X4 M as well as the Alpina B3.
The six-cylinder Supra available today has 382 hp but the BMW M engine is capable of much more. Even the base M4 has 473 hp on tap, followed by the M4 Competition at 503 hp. Then there’s the M4 CSL with 543 hp to match the M3 CS and next year’s M4 CS. In the 3.0 CSL limited to 50 units, the engineers squeezed an extra 10 hp for a grand total of 553 hp.
Your guess is as good as ours regarding how much power BMW will allow Toyota to give the Supra GRMN. Our money would be on somewhere in the region of 500 hp but without stepping on the M4 CS’ toes. Provided it’ll have more than than the 473 hp of the standard M4, don’t hold your breath for a clutch pedal since the M4 Competition and M4 CSL come exclusively with an automatic. The 3.0 CSL special edition did have a six-speed manual but that prompted BMW to limit torque to 404 lb-ft (550 Nm) instead of giving the S58 the full 479 lb-ft (650 Nm).
The Nissan Z Nismo rival could end up as a limited-run special edition in the same vein as Yaris GRMN launched in early 2022. The previous-generation hot hatch was also built in small numbers. Don’t be too surprised if this will be the Supra’s swan song since BMW insiders claim the mechanically related Z4 will go out of production at Magna Steyr’s plant in Graz, Austria in 2026 without a replacement planned. Before it bows out, the Bavarian roadster is rumored to finally combine the inline-six engine with a manual gearbox for a three-pedal Z4 M40i to echo the six-speed, six-cylinder Supra.
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