Used 2022 Subaru WRX GT

The WRX is an excellent GT, offering a combination of comfort and performance that is as entertaining as anything available today. If you like going fast, the WRX is for you! Sporty, responsive and very fun to drive. If you are looking for a gas saver, then this is NOT the car for you. This car is for someone interested in feeling the road and handling every turn with precision! Such a joy to shift and hear the Boxer engine and cruise, in my opinion. Love the way it handles and drives. Sounds awesome even with the stock exhaust. You can hear it inside the house during cold starts, so awesome! I don’t think there is another car that compares in this price range. The AWD system is great and has no issues. Among performance cars, on a scale from 1 to 10, today’s WRX holds its head up proudly at a solid 9. If you’re old enough to remember the age before pollution controls and safety features, you won’t argue with me when I cite the 1971 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 as a 10 (“Relaxed at 140, undemanding at 150…controllable at 193…but acceleration tends to fall off after 155,” according to the contemporary Road & Track article). Back to the WRX, I hadn’t passed the break-in period at the time I started writing (see below), and the manual advises short shifting at 4000 until that point. I’ve been observing 3,000, because the WRX is turbocharged and boost comes on strongly a little above 3,000 so that stopping the acceleration precisely at 4,000 is a challenge. So, I didn’t experience the full performance of the car at first. Nevertheless, its capabilities are obviously huge, triggering a flood of cliches from the sports cars of the 60’s-70’s. “Corners as if on rails…steering direct and linear up to speeds where I don’t want to find out if it understeers, oversteers, or just slides sideways at the limit…glued to the pavement.” There’s no body roll, no squeal from the tires, and acceleration even in top gear is pleasantly lively through 55, without ever exceeding 3,000 on the tachometer. When we consider that this “old fashioned” performance comes in a 4-door sedan with comfortable accommodations (at least in front) for a tall driver, yet, unlike BMW sedans at the time I bought mine, you can get it with a manual transmission, I hardly think the basic design could be improved. The seats are firmly bolstered; the designers obviously thought hard cornering would be happening a lot of the time, and so it should! The WRX is a Gran Turismo, though, not a sports car, as befits something with 4 doors and a useful back seat. Its cabin is fairly quiet and you won’t be pulled over because the exhaust is making such a racket that you’re making cows miscarry. (You might be pulled over because you’re going 80 in a 35 mile zone but that’s your own fault). Now let’s mention ride…another 60’s cliché comes unbidden to my computer: “if you run over a coin, you can tell if it’s a dime or a quarter.” The ride is tightly snubbed and very hard. For a GT, I question whether this is necessary. A similar odd decision from the designers is to deliver the car with summer-only high performance tires. To their credit, the dealer suggested I buy all season tires because this would have to be my only car, a daily driver, I can’t afford a sports car that I would take out only on nice days with another car getting the groceries. There are high performance, all season tires these days, and that’s what it’s riding on now. They cost $1000. Hard to imagine how summer-only tires could be better. The all weather tires should be a factory option for those who don’t have space to store the summer tires. On the other hand, it’s no longer 1968. Some things are better but others aren’t as good as in the old days. The transmission has 6 forward speeds, which means it’s often not obvious with the optional “short-throw” shifter what gear it’s in. The manufacturer gave us a dashboard indicator to tell you that, but it’s low on the panel where it’s partly obscured by the steering wheel hub unless you adjust the tilt wheel and seat height carefully. (On the other hand it’s good there are many adjustments, unlike the sports cars of the 60’s). Worse, the indicator doesn’t show anything until you let in the clutch, when it’s too late to correct having selected the wrong gate. I understand why this is: it’s a “smart” manual transmission that won’t let you start the engine till you’ve floored the clutch, and the indicator evidently takes its signal from the same source so it can’t show anything until then.

• Navigation system
• Lane departure
• Automatic temperature control
• Emergency communication system
• Power moonroof
• Wireless phone connectivity
• Exterior parking camera rear
• Front dual zone A/C
• Auto high-beam headlights
• Auto-dimming rearview mirror
• Split folding rear seat
• Heated front seats
• All weather package
• Push button start
• Keyless entry
• Backup camera
• Blind Spot Detection warning
• Adaptive Cruise Control: EyeSight Advanced Adaptive Cruise Control
• Sport suspension
• Harman/kardon speakers
• Apple CarPlay/Android Auto integration

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