Spoiler alert: The enhanced edition of Toyota’s family-sized hot hatch is here to sell a message rather than to reap sales.

THE good news is that some will get to play - the bad is that even those who might really, really want and could easily one cannot have it. At least, not through official channels.

Toyota New Zealand’s announcement it secured examples of the GRMN flagship version of the GR Corolla that has benefitted from extreme performance enhancements, ordered by company boss Akio Toyoda, is a delight - and a cruel tease.

The Palmerston North-based market leader has explained the super-hot motorsport special edition is not set for sale here alongside the ‘regular’ GR Corolla, a $69,990 model.

The examples it has imported are purely here to showcase Gazoo Racing’s most extreme engineering.

Shorthand for Gazoo Racing Masters of Nurburgring, a reference to both Toyota’s racing organisation and also the world-famous track where GR tests and races, the GRMN name is used by Toyota for its most aggressive limited-edition performance cars.

It first applied to the GRMN Yaris sold in Japan in 2022 and is going to apply with a high-performance V8 coupe here next year.

In addition to development through track testing at the German circuit, the GRMN Corolla also went through its paces in Japan's Super Taikyu Series and many of the enhancements used on the circuit are referenced by the road car.

Specific upgrades over the standard GR Corolla include a tall carbon-fibre rear spoiler, an exposed carbon-fibre bonnet, front wheel arches with additional vents, and 18-inch forged wheels with a gold paint finish and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 track-day tyres.

Chassis and handling performance have been sharpened through dedicated suspension tuning, including high-performance monotube shock absorbers and wider rubber, along with refinements to steering for improved feedback and control during high-load driving.

How much horsepower? The GR Corolla here has 221kW and 400Nm in its latest iteration; it also sells in eight-speed automatic as well as six-speed manual.

The GRMN car is manual only and according to the GRMN website it makes just 3kW and 15Nm extra on the dyno. It is more reliant on the extra aero, the tweaked all-wheel-drive and those stickier tyres to lower its lap times.

Though the five door body shell is retained, the rear seats have been pulled as a weight saving. It’s the second GR Corolla to issue as a two-seater, the other being the defunct Morizo (Toyoda’s racing name).

In the GRMN there are new front bucket seats with red and black upholstery plus red seatbelts, a suede-trimmed steering wheel, a red-accented suede-wrapped shifter, and GRMN badging.

TNBZ says the cars will display at “a series of upcoming activations designed to connect local enthusiasts with the core of Toyota’s performance philosophy.”

The cars’ presence, it says, reflects a broader commitment to sharing the GR story – bringing the most specialised expressions of the brand to the communities that follow it.

“GR has always been about learning through driving and competition – and GRMN is the result of taking that philosophy to its extreme,” a release quoting Andrew Davis, a TNZ chief strategic officer and part-time race driver (last outing was a 24 hour Lemons race at Hampton Downs as part of a Celica team).

"Kiwis are big performance car enthusiasts who are following the GR journey closely and like to customise their GR cars.

“Because of this passion we now offer them a range of performance parts, and when we were given the opportunity to showcase a full factory GRMN car, we jumped at it. We are excited to see it hit our shores,” he said.

Further details on where it will be seen will be announced in due course.