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Prodrive receives new Impreza

An all-new Subaru Impreza hatchback (“Nose Jobs,” AW, April 9) arrived at the Subaru World Rally Team’s head-quarters in Banbury, England. Factory team Prodrive is assessing the car before building the first Impreza WRC2008. The team hopes to have the car running by summer for a comprehensive test program before it debuts on the 2008 Monte Carlo Rally.

The new Impreza is a crucial model for Subaru racing, which banks on it to halt the team’s recent declining performance and to safeguard the rally program’s future.

“We’ve had a good look around the car, and it looks very good,” said Steve Farrell, Prodrive’s engineering director. “Immediately, you look at it and know it will be better from an aerodynamic point of view. We want to be back in the winner’s circle regularly with this car. That’s what everybody around here is used to, and we’ve been away for too long.”

One improvement is to the transmission, an Achilles’ heel of today’s car. The team will build a system with mechanical front and rear differentials. The engine is also new, though Subaru’s trademark boxer layout remains. The secrecy around the new Impreza, internally named S14, is so great that neither driver Petter Solberg nor teammate Chris Atkinson has seen it.