By Mike Musto

AKA Mr. Angry

Subaru loyalist rejoice! Your mountain rescue vehicle has arrived. This thing is actually pretty badass considering it started life as a new Forester. Fender flairs, a warn winch and some crazy suspension mods have turned this mild-mannered grocery getter into a mean mountain rescue unit. Obviously, Subaru will never make this, but the cool thing, as with all concept cars and trucks, is they give the consumer ideas. Good ideas.

Continue reading "Bad Ass Mountain Rescue Scoobie…" »

Earlier this year, my better half finally talked me into buying a Subaru for family hauling duties. Since this was my first experience with something that wasn’t an old RWD Mopar or Volvo, I knew I needed to find a good Subaru mechanic. I asked Ryan Douthit, who owns Subiesport, and he recommended Smart Service up in Shoreline (just north of Seattle). Last week I brought our car in to Smart for the 60k service and spent some time talking to Gary Cavett, their Service Advisor.

In his spare time, Gary races a Pro-Rally Impreza, and he just put together a cool ride page for his rally car, and even uploaded some video. Gary has been at this for almost ten years, and he and his team were the 2005 Northwest Region Pacific Rally Series overall champions. As you might expect, racing at this level is not cheap. Costs can be well over $4,000 per event. You’re looking at $700-1100 for entry fees, $800-1000 for tires, $600 for race fuel and another $1,000+ for hotel/gas/food/transport. And that doesn’t even include the car and all the stuff you’re gonna break! We’ll be sure to follow Gary’s progress during the 2009 season, so stay tuned.

The largest all-Subaru motorsport event in North America is back! Subiefest 2008 presented by Subaru and EDO Performance/Zero Sports, will take over Willow Springs Raceway in Rosamond, California this weekend for the ultimate All-Subaru Showoff and Shootout. Meet Subaru Rally Team driver and X Games champion Ken Block, watch the fastest Subarus in the country battle on Big Willow, and rock out to the infectious Seattle sound of The Endeavors, performing live on the Perrin Performance Main Stage. Vendors, show cars and the Saturday Night Subiesport Magazine desert party are all part of Subiefest 2008! For more info visit Subiefest.com.

Consider your average racetrack: By itself it’s just a strip of pavement, and not a very attractive strip at that. It will certainly have crumbling edges, linear grooves carved into its back and strokes of melted rubber slathered in crazed zig-zags—usually near the corners. And unlike public roads, it doesn’t even go anywhere. It just sits there, baking in the sun.

Add a couple thousand pounds of steel, several gallons of petrol and a piece of meat behind the wheel, and that lonely and circuitous path takes on a whole new meaning. It has a rhythm, a harmony. Much like with music, it’s not just the instrument; the composer and performer are important, too. Change any one of these elements and a delicate concerto can easily be warped into a bombastic stadium anthem.

This brings me to a day I spent recently at Willow Springs Raceway in Rosamond, California. I flew into LAX on the red eye from Seattle, picked up an Evolution X MR from the press fleet–thanks, Mitsubishi–and made the trek an hour and a half north towards the desert.

This wasn’t my first time with the Evo X. I had already driven it around Laguna Seca for a couple laps earlier this year as part of a massive press day. Back then I even took the Vishu-tuned EVO GSR for a spin. To be honest, that whole day was a haze of petroleum-induced overload. Simply too many cars in one day. I do remember preferring the punkier Vishnu GSR, but that’s about it. Continue reading…

Continue reading "Symphony of Speed" »

Well, it’s certainly been a busy few weeks in my little corner of the motoring world. Just a few weeks ago my group wrapped its first Driving Sports Time Attack Challenge, which was held as part of the Mazda Grand Prix of Portland, in Oregon. In all an eclectic mix of 22 cars turned out to prove their mettle on the freshly repaved curves of Portland International Raceway.
 
At the end of the day Cobb Tuning’s awesome 2009 GT-R took the champion’s podium in the AWD PRO class (1:22:19), followed by Dr. Rick Edwards in a 2008 Mustang FR500S spec racer in the RWD PRO class (1:26:012), and a big golf clap to Erick Miller for rounding up FWD PRO in his 1993 Honda Civic (1:33:12).  Worth noting, Steve Pepka in the Supra 6-powered 1971 Datsun 510 pulled a 1:31:294, pretty impressive for a nearly 40 year old chassis. Continue reading… 

Continue reading "Time Attack Recap" »

Ryan Douthit and the Driving Sports guys have been covering the Oregon Trail Rally this weekend (with Ken Block and Tanner Foust in the mix). Go here for the most recent video coverage. And if you want a little background, Ryan has all the videos from last year’s rally here.   

One of the perks of my job is that I get a chance to go to some very cool places and, in turn, drive some amazing cars. Last fall I crossed the Atlantic to visit what I would call "the happiest place on earth" for car nuts. No, not Disneyland Paris: I’m talking about Prodrive’s test facility in the UK.

My main point of the trip was to hang with the Subaru World Rally Team during Wales Rally GB, courtesy of Subaru of America–quite an adventure in itself. But it’s one thing to talk cars and watch them zip by at breakneck speed. It’s so much better to be driving them, which is why I so looked forward to the Prodrive visit.

I had the chance to drive a 2007 Type UK STI on Prodrive’s private road course and then tried my hand on the ice simulator, behind the wheel of a UK 2008 WRX (all of these cars were all right-hand drive, by the way). But those Subies were nothing when compared to my final car of the day: Yes, I had the chance to drive a Prodrive Group-N WRC car. Continue reading…

Even though the Group-N cars are based on production models and are delivered from Subaru in 100% working order, Prodrive spares no expense to make them even better. From seam-welding the entire body for added rigidity, to grinding paint to the metal and re-coating, just to save those precious few ounces necessary for a winning race car. The end result is stunning: a car that turns on a dime and wears like a finely tailored suit. I want one. Only problem is, I don’t have a spare $250,000 plus the expense necessary to buy the required spare transmission and motor. Bummer.

You may not be able to own your own WRC car, but you can watch some pretty good rallying here in the States. Check out www.rally-america.com for the largest US-series, with events throughout the country. Of course, we also cover the WRC and US events in Subiesport Magazine.

Subaru makes some fast factory cars. Specifically, its rally-bred STI is known for a 300hp fire-breathing mill and excellent road-handling capabilities.  However, as much as I like speed, I prefer to have something a little less "racer boy" for my daily driver. I like the feel of Subaru’s boxer motors and the driver ergonomics, I also happen to run a Subaru magazine, so it only made sense that I looked elsewhere in the ‘roo family when selecting a car for my own. In the end I chose a model with styling and an interior I could live with every day: a 2007 Subaru Legacy GT.

Stock, the Legacy GT has a 248-hp turbocharged motor that shares many components with the STI. Though, unlike the STI, you can get leather, a moonroof and body styling that doesn’t look like it was an afterthought. In fact, I’d say the 2007-08 Legacy is one of the better-looking cars on the road today.
Of course, given my occupation, this car didn’t stay stock long. Shortly after break-in we started the first phase of changes in the “need for speed” category. This included a larger turbo, fatter top-mount intercooler and a Perrin turbo-back exhaust system.  All the parts were tuned using an ECUTek reflash and netted a tidy 280 wheel horse-power.

I ran that config for a good year and was pretty happy with the overall performance: the 18G Blouch/TDC Turbo spooled fast and had enough scoot for the occasional track day or Time Attack race. The Achilles heel was the top end. Power came fast, but didn’t stick around, making long straight-aways on the track my nemesis. Also, in hot conditions, such as I faced at the 2007 Tuner Shootout in Nevada, the top-mount intercooler just couldn’t keep temperatures at bay.

Before we started on “Phase 2“ of this Legacy GT build, my technical editor Tim Bailey and I changed the engine management to a Cobb Accessport 2.0 (it wasn’t available for the car’s CANBUS system when we did Phase 1) and played around to see if we could break 300whp mark with the existing configuration. All indications were good, but then made a mistake, by pushing the tune with stock injectors and “trying some stuff” in an uncontrolled situation, followed by me flogging the car around our test course. That mix spelled disaster for piston #2: we broke a ring and smoking immediately followed. This is otherwise known as the “change engine indicator” coming on. Yes kids, don’t try this at home, we’re professionals.

In the tuning world the death of one engine often leads to the development of a newer, stronger mill to replace it. This project is no different. Out with the stock (busted) shortblock, and in with a brand-spankin’-new STI block with a special ingredient: Cosworth forged pistons.  This was assembled for us by the guys at PDXTuning in Portland, Oregon.

While the motor was out, we finally installed some larger injectors (from our friends at Deatschwerks), slapped on a larger AVO 420 turbo (installed by Rallitek performance), and fitted a Perrin front-mount intercooler to help keep temperatures more consistent. The clutch was also fried, so in went an ACT heavy-duty clutch kit along with the ACT streetlite flywheel. If you’re keeping score, yes, not much of the original confirmation remained when all was said and done.

For the tune, we took the car to Steve’s Pacific Import Auto in Tacoma, Wash., where Tim Bailey (our technical editor and owner of Surgeline tuning) was finally able to put together a proper tune on their dyno. End result? 320 wheel-horsepower and 320 ft-lbs of torque, measured at the wheels on the Mystang dyno, running 92 octane fuel.

Unfortunately, I can’t give you all the facts about this new build, since it is an ongoing project car for Subiesport Magazine, and is scheduled to appear in an upcoming issue — we have to keep some morsels for the magazine. But I can say this: It’s fast, but not fast enough.  Certainly faster than any stock STI, but that’s not what I want. I don’t think I’ll be happy with this setup until we hit or surpass a safe 350whp, which will require some more changes.

The fact that we’re not done yet is okay by me. In many ways, testing all these different setups is more fun than the destination itself. Stay tuned, as the adventure continues.

I’m a magazine publisher and video producer. I’ve been invited to add my thoughts to the CarDomain blog, as I seem to spend a lot of time driving and breaking them "in the line of duty." Specifically, I’m known for my Subaru Magazine (Subiesport), a pair of Mazda Magazines (Mazdasport and Forever MX-5) and a TV-show-turned-web-series called Driving Sports TV. I torture clutches, scorch tires and make a general mess of things for the sake of my dedicated readers.

However, even with several cars in my name and a world of knowledge from my staff and those I associate with every day, I’m not beyond getting myself into a transportation pickle. Case in point, a couple weeks ago when I had to bum a ride from my father-in-law, just to get to work. Continue reading…

You’d think someone who spends as much time around cars as I do would be a bit more careful about keeping at least one ticking. It was one of those times when I felt less like 35-year-old professional, and more like a miscreant: jacked up on too much Grand Theft Auto 4 and Red Bull, looking to take my rampage on the vehicles in my care.

Naturally, my father-in-law inquired about my daily driver first, a 2007 Subaru Legacy GT. I had to confess I yanked the ECU to get it reset, in preparation for a story. The company doing the work accidentally sent it back to me via ground-mail (even though I specified next day priority)–so it’s "in the system."

He didn’t seem to think that ripping my ECU out was a good idea, especially for a car I just bought last year. "How about that ‘Zero’ project, the silver Subaru you built for your Subaru Magazine and raced at Portland?" He pressed. I had to admit, that car’s motor–and most of the interior–is currently sitting outside the car in a garage down in Portland.

"The Miata?"

"Motor torn apart in preparation for a new turbo kit," I replied dryly.

"How about that really old rust-bucket, from the 70s, that little green Subaru?"

It was obvious I was beginning to appear less-and-less like a responsible family man, and more like vehicular hoodlum.   

"Oh, that?" I hesitated. "I blew the head-gasket last summer. Head needs to come off."

After a long pause, he probed further. "You didn’t take Melissa’s car apart, too. Did you?"

No. That was true, my wife’s Mazda3 was still road-worthy. That was practically a vow she had me include in our wedding, "thou shalt not approach this woman’s vehicle with intent to ‘improve’ it in any way, less thou shalt face much pain and suffering. If you agree, say ‘I do.’" More or less, I forget the exact words.

Here’s a tip for the would-be tuners out there. First, don’t disassemble the last working vehicle you own; it makes getting around a bit of a challenge from day-to-day. Second, don’t ask your father-in-law to lend you his car when you do. Walk to work if you have to. The consequence is more embarrassment than it’s worth.

Note: the car pictured above is Ryan’s daily driver… when it was running. Since this picture was taken, he’s also blown a piston and has a new motor on order. Ah, the joys of "testing."

I’m happy to report that Patrick Ernzen of Desert-Motors is going to start hooking us up with some of his killer automotive photography (you may remember the 246 Dino I had in the blog last year). To give you a taste of what he is capable of, here are some pics left on the cutting room floor from a recent Subiesport article on the 2008 Vivid Racing Subaru WRX. This car was first shown at SEMA last year, and has a whole host of mods, including a turbo kit, exhaust, coilovers, control arms, intake manifold, fuel rails, ECU tuning, big brakes and wheels and a custom aero kit (full details at Vivid Racing). Look for Patrick’s SECC Cars and Coffee shoot in our Events section in the next few days. And we have a ton more photos of the WRX after the jump.

Continue reading "2008 Vivid Racing Subaru WRX" »