3:30 AM wake-up calls are early. I’m a crack-of-dawn kind of person, but this particular hour is more the middle of the night. Such is the sacrifice required to uncork a Toyota GR Corolla on one of my favorite roads - the Merritt Parkway in Connecticut. These days, this alternative to I-95 is generally jammed, teeming humanity fumbling about with pathetic attempts at driving.
Warning: Curves Ahead
Which is a shame as the stretch of this parkway running south from the 95 interchange all the way to the intersection with 287 is packed with yellow signs, blinking arrows, and white pavement paint warning you of curves ahead. Crucially, big rigs have never been allowed on the Merritt. In the early aughts, you could slice up those S-curves, during a midday run, with light traffic, while trying to hang with the occasional 911 screaming through Greenwich.
So, when an opportunity arose to travel the Merritt Parkway behind the wheel of a 2026 Toyota GR Corolla, plans were hatched. Living in New Hampshire, I have a 2 ½ ride to Meriden - the Merrit’s northern entrance. Leaving on a Saturday in July, heavy traffic was to be expected. So, I got up at 3:30 in the middle of the night, showered, picked up a soup tureen of the blackest Dunkin, and hit the road. All to get in front of the Merritt meatballs who live to ruin a good drive.
Not Your Average Corolla
Finished in Supersonic “Arrest Me” Red, the Gazooified Corolla looks bananas. The example Toyota graciously lent me was further spiced up with a big basket handle of a rear spoiler. Bulging fenders, vented body panels (functional!), and a triple exhaust stack are the key visual giveaways that this is no garden variety Corolla. Were you to be riding high, you’d also see the forged carbon fiber roof that’s included on Premium Plus variants.
On my drive from New Hampshire to New Jersey, I spotted exactly one other GR Corolla heading north - and I was looking. It’s not the kind of car your average commuter would notice. Friends and neighbors not into cars generally questioned the sanity of spending $47,000 on what might seem to be nothing more than a racy red econo-hatch.
But those in the know shared thumbs up in passing. I even participated in some kind of secret automotive courting ritual that must happen among the fart pipe crowd. On my way through Hartford, a goofy-looking Jetta rolled up alongside and proceeded to zing the bejeezus out of shiny fart pipes dangling off the rear end. I was impressed…that nothing fell off.
Gazoo Racing Employs Wizards
Boy-racer looks aside, the GR Corolla is something of an automotive engineering masterpiece. Your standard Toyota Corolla comes with a naturally aspirated 2.0L inline-4 producing 169 horsepower and 151 lb-ft of torque. It pairs with a CVT to create one snoozer of a sedan, albeit a practical, reliable, and objectively good snoozer. Once the folks at Gazoo Racing get done with the Corolla, however, it’s a wholly different beast.
Under the hood hides a turbocharged 1.6L inline-3 huffing on up to 26 psi of boost. Toyota lifts it from the GR Yaris and here it cranks out 300 hp and 295 lb-ft of torque. That translates to a specific output of 187.5 hp/L, which puts this little ripper in rarefied air. The 1,500-horse 8.0L quad-turbo 16-cylinder gazillion-dollar Bugatti Chiron is identical on this metric. Unlike that thundering behemoth bred for top speed runs, the GR Corolla thrives in the twisties.
6-Speed Manual FTW
You can spend $2,000 for the optional 8-speed automatic, but a 6-speed manual comes standard and is so much more fun. As a middle-aged relatively sedentary computer keyboard jockey, my weakling legs cringed under the Corolla’s clutch effort - at first. You see, my 10-year old Mazda6 has a well-worn, feathery light clutch. But after hundreds of miles, I became accustomed and did not end up with cramped quads as feared.
The iMT button - short for intelligent Manual Transmission - which activates an automatic rev-matching system, was not for me as it dialed up the revviness a bit too much. But it’s easily left off. And while I found the rowing action smooth and easy, if ever there was a candidate for an aftermarket short shift kit, the GR Corolla is it. As for handling, it was sharp. The AWD system can be modified to adjust front-to-rear torque splits through the dual Torsen diffs, but I left it in Normal mode and had a blast.
Harsh impacts are expertly rounded off - no surprise - helping to build confidence through tight sweepers. Turbo lag is barely there, and with this hottest Corolla running at high boil through the Merritt Parkway’s southern reaches, slow pokes were passed with ease and corner exits were…exciting.
Where Do I Sign?
You can’t hear it with the windows down at highway speed, but around town, little blow-off valve whooshes remind you that this is no ordinary Corolla. As do the fatly bolstered and embroidered front buckets - that I’d argue could use a bit more bolster - rumble on start-up, and aggressive stance. The thing is, I already love ordinary Corollas; they’re just great cars. But holy moly, in GR spec, this is a Toyota Corolla that has me absolutely smitten.
About the author: Niel Stender is an automotive journalist. More of his work can be found at muckrack.com/niel-stender