Toyota what?? Etios makes global statement

This weekend a car that's never before been seen by even diehard rally fans in the  northern hemisphere hit the stages of the world  and the african continental championships, raised eyebrows and won hearts. The little Toyota Etios, hitherto in R2 spec has been dominating the South African national championship with Guy Botteril at the wheel. The pocket rocket is a very good car and South Africa has the best drivers on the continent but in the last two years no combination of driver and car had been able to subordinate the Skoda Fabia R5 in the hands of two time and defending African champion Manvir Baryan.



South Africans have however been developing a more potent spec of the Etios to compete on the regional stage but probably not on the world stage. To this end Rally Technic, put together an R4 spec Etios using the FIA homologated  kit that's supplied by Oreca.  The car remains small, a little bigger than the R2 but not as menacing and aggressive as the R5. It also costs less than half the price of any European R5.



To give the Etios R4 it's African intro, Rally Technic called on the services of long time South African champion and works VW driver Hergen Fekken to drive it in the second round of the 2019 African rally championship, the rally of South Africa. By the time day one and 8 stages was done, the Etios had won 8 stages and led the rally by 44s. On day two between a combination of taking it easy on the part of Fekken and suspension problems on one hand, and on the other a big push from the R5 drivers, Baryan and Gomes in a Fiesta, each notched up a stage win with Fekken winning the other two to seal the rally victory with 38s over the defending champions and surprise surprise Guy Botteril in the R2 Etios sealing the podium.



On the other side of the Southern Hemisphere global fans were bedazzled by a strange looking Toyota Etios R5 driven by Alejandro Galanti and running in 11th overall from saturday morning at Xion WRC rally Argentina. On the skin of it, The Etios R5 looks very much like the R4 that won africa on the same weekend.  The car  received plenty live tv coverage by the wrc broadcaster all the way into the power stage which is usually the reserve of world championship contenders. The Etios R5 doesn't have global homologation and only run in the national championship category of rally Argentina which it won by a mile as well as the overall trophy for 11th but no world championship points.

Cars developed in the Southern Hemisphere tend to be cheaper but less popular than those born and bred in Europe and many never make international homologation.  Besides the financial costs of homologation there may be other reasons like lack of support from the  manufacturer who may be pushing a different brand - and in this case Toyota has already nominated the Yaris as its current flag bearer and may not support the Etios Which is not marketed in the northern hemisphere. However, following the global attention garnered this weekend, one can always hope. But whether or not international homologation comes, regional and national championships have a very interesting proposition from arguably the most affordable and reliable and now exciting car brand in the world.  Better still a formula spec that's  perhaps not based on the still expensive for Africa Oreca kit To drive ARC regional car prices back down into the range of Group N and drive entries up to where they were in the first decade of the millennium.