Review and photos by Jonathan Yarkony
 Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
Any time a manufacturer borrows a term from their native language for a special edition, you know that we auto writers are going to offer a translation and play with the theme. Ad nauseam.
Well, I’m here to tell you that Subaru got it wrong. You see, shortly after picking up Subaru’s most potent pocket rocket WRX STI in this year’s unique Tsurugi Edition, I dubbed it the Ninja Edition. Why name a car that has its big brash spoiler and loud gold wheels stripped after a traditional sword? This is a stealth edition. No, no, that just won’t do. An automotive ninja capable of delivering a variety of weapons silently… er, okay, maybe not silently, but definitely capable of blending in with traffic only to erupt into action at the slightest provocation. Yup, this trim deserves to bear the name of Japan’s famed elite, super-secret, super-stealthy warriors.
Our particular tester was rendered in a pearlescent Storm Shadow white (for those of you not up on your GI Joe characters, that’s not actually Subaru’s name for the colour…), ready to blend into our snowy, wintry Canadian landscape. As fortune would have it, our week was dry and warm, so Subaru’s symmetrical AWD was put to more entertaining and perhaps slightly less responsible use maintaining grip in turns, curves and onramps. Oh boy, does this thing ever grip. I had passengers reaching for the holy, um, smoke handles when I ‘demonstrated’ the STI’s capabilities. Lucky for them I was taking it easy. Plenty of credit goes to the tires, super-sticky Dunlops (SP600 245/40R18 summer performance tires) that seemed locked onto the tarmac in any situation.
   Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
But before I get too far into the evaluation, a quick word about this new Tsurugi edition, priced at $41,495 with a $1,650 Freight & PDI charge. Exclusive to the Canadian market (we never did get the ‘Halloween’ Special Edition WRX/STI painted in vivid Tangerine orange that the Yanks got), the Tsurugi first deletes the massive spoiler and gold wheels (in truth, those gold wheels are really just an option, anyway), then inserts 18-inch Enkei cast alloy wheels and a front lip spoiler to replace the downforce of the deleted spoiler. Rounding out the look are multi-reflector halogen fog lights, HID xenon headlight projectors and mirror-integrated LED turn signals and the Kanji character for tsurugi on the trunklid (at least I’m assuming it’s the Kanji character for tsurugi – it definitely looks like a sword-ish character).
Interior features include power sunroof and automatic climate control, auto-dimming mirror and a Kicker 10-inch subwoofer to enhance your enjoyment of Backspin and other bass-heavy satellite radio favourites. Subaru tries to class it up with leather seating surfaces and stitched badging, but like the C6 Corvette, there is only so much a special edition can do to distract from a fairly basic and outdated interior. While basic, it is sufficiently functional, and for the engineering packaged into the STI for $40K, it seems like a fair sacrifice in the name of cheap thrills.
    Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
The most relevant pieces of the STI interior are the seats (and specifically the driver’s seat – screw all the passengers), steering wheel, pedals and shifter. Steering wheel is adjustable for reach and tilt, and the shifter falls easily to hand and the pedals are drilled alloys with a full dead pedal – I found the brake-accelerator spacing too wide for effective heel-toe work, but could be a longer period of adjustment or a proper day at the track is required to adjust – a week never seems like enough with a performance car of this calibre. There is no question that STIs and WRXs are a common sighting at pretty much every track day I’ve ever been to, so take that as a grassroots hearsay recommendation.
 Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
The seat is a high-backed bucket with sporty bolsters and the STI logo stitched into the integrated headrest. The leather is decent and there is no question that they add a touch of class, but for performance use, give me the Recaros in the Boss Mustang anyday, with extremely high bolsters and alcantara inserts that grip you in place like a velcro supermagnet. Then again, seats that aggressive might have been at odds with Subaru’s goal of adding a touch of class to this model for its swan song. The next generation of WRX and STI are not far off.
 Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
Mechanically, the STI is something of an engineering masterpiece, even at the end of its life cycle. The horizontally opposed four-cylinder measures 2.5L in displacement, and with intercooled turbocharging produces 305 hp at 6,000 rpm and 290 lb-ft of torque at 4,000 rpm. It weighs 1,535 kg (3,384 lb). Subaru estimates the sprint to 100 km/h can be dispatched in 4.9 seconds. This estimate is good for any trim, from the $38,195 base four-door to the $42,595 Sport-Tech hatch. Then again, the base WRX, with ‘only’ 265 hp is estimated at 5.4 seconds. That is some cheap speed, and it doesn’t take a drag racer to hook it up either – just point and shoot and the all-wheel drive will put the power down and launch you plenty quick for anything but a drag strip.
There is power everywhere, and the six-speed manual has just enough ratios to offer the right power for any situation. If I had one complaint, it’s that redline always seemed to arrive just a tad too soon – another nuance that might take a track day to adjust to, or perhaps I just wanted to hear more of that turbo-four boxer screaming at full throttle. At low rpms, it’s just loud and irritating.
For a car this light, brakes don’t have to work too hard, and these were up to the task, ventilated rotors measuring 326 x 30 mm with four-piston calipers in front and 316 x 20 mm with dual-piston calipers in the back – these brakes were cited as one of the main improvements from the WRX to the STI in Car & Driver’s 2011 Lightning Lap.
  Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
Subaru’s symmetrical all-wheel-drive system is one of the most stable and predictable systems out there, and in the STI it is taken to the next level in terms of performance and control. Dubbed Multi-Mode DCCD (Driver Controlled Centre Differential), the AWD system is manually adjustable through a switch on the centre console, allowing up to a permanent 41:59 front/rear torque distribution. The switch allows you to adjust to three automatic settings, the default setting a neutral balance for everyday driving, Auto+ favouring the front wheels (for a more safety-oriented ride in snowy or slick conditions) and Auto– the rears (for more dynamic RWD-like handling characteristics) or you can manually select from six levels of fixed torque split between the standard 50:50 and that maximum 41:59 rear bias. If nothing else, it’s fun to switch the button between all the various lighting schemes in the colourful gauge cluster.
  Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
Also adjustable by a larger knob ahead of the MDDC controls is the overall power delivery characteristics, which Subaru dubs SI-Drive. Normal efficiency mode is I (intelligent), though that saw little use in my week in the STI. There is almost nothing about this car that makes me drive intelligently, its noise and raw power and undiluted suspension demanding you drive at minimum 8/10ths, which is already something like 12/10ths illegal, or perhaps even more, like, 120 percent… The STI’s natural state is S# (Sport sharp), in which throttle response is significantly sharpened and immediate. However, upon restart, you’ll find that the bell-curve people have dialed it back to just plain S (Sport), a middle-ground compromise between efficiency and aggression that is fine for daily driving that is not corners, onramps or green lights at the front of the line.
  Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
All of this mechanical gibberish is well and good, but the STI is one of those cars where you feel the engineering in every turn and maneuver, not just in glossy marketing brochures, not just in rain and snow, and not just because there is next to no sound insulation. You will likely hear the electronically controlled centre differential clunking away and balancing torque transfer in any of the auto modes (based on vehicle acceleration, deceleration, steering angle, cornering force and wheel slippage as detected by steering angle, throttle position, rpm, lateral g, yaw, brake, ABS and wheel-speed sensors – no really, it can do all that without a calculator). However, it would take more fine-tuned ears than mine to note the front helical LSD and rear Torsen LSD locking the respective axles to ensure that the inside wheels in a corner don’t spin out of control and equal torque is distributed to both sides.
What I could detect was an amazing balance and traction when rounding my favourite onramps, the STI always capable of staying neutral and offering more acceleration on tap than I was willing to pour – I was already at highway speeds exiting the corner, so the way I see it, that’ll do. In turn, at the limit, the body is so wonderfully balanced that a touch of throttle lift tucks the nose in, and unwinding the steering just a touch opens up enough stability to exit hot. Word on the track is that the STI understeers heavily at the limits, but those limits were well beyond even my tolerance for hooning on public roads – at any speeds within reason, the STI simply grips and goes. Perhaps a snow test is in order to lower those limits….
  Test Drive: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi. Click image to enlarge |
It doesn’t take any sort of fine-tuned senses to ‘appreciate’ the distinctly performance-oriented suspension settings. The ride is hard and flat in the corners, but despite the single-minded devotion to cornering stability, I did not find the ride objectionable on moderately rough surfaces (as some have noted – so I may simply have a taste and tolerance for hard rides), although some construction zones may have compressed a few discs in my spine.
But where the chassis and drivetrain is brilliant, Subaru’s own BRZ has shown that the STI has room to improve in steering feel and transmission operation. Steering is a bit loose on centre, but then almost overcompensates by being super quick once it hooks up, and at a constant steering angle, the steering again lightens up. The clutch is neither too heavy nor too light, but the pedal travel was a bit long before engaging, and the throws were a bit on the rubbery side even if they were admirably short. All these things the $27,295 BRZ does better, if memory serves.
So there you have it. Subaru has two models in their that offer stupendous performance of varying degrees suited to various tastes. The BRZ is the traditional RWD driver’s machine, light on power (and weight), but rewarding and engaging in almost every action of every drive.
The STI is a technical mastery of physics that I can barely comprehend, powerful, raw and stupid fast while still being functional year round in four-door sedan or particularly in five-door hatchback mode. It almost seems like a contradiction to offer a stealthy edition of this loud, brash, unadulterated performance machine, but as the pricing creeps up, no doubt the STI’s demographic is shifting to those that want some of the finer amenities even if they are not attached to a luxury car.
The Tsurugi Edition is that contradiction, and Subaru has named it well after a traditional double-edged broadsword (but I do still prefer Ninja!), doing their best to offer a value-laden package on an aging but still spectacular mechanical masterpiece. The STI remains one of the best performance values on the market, and still offers a unique package for those looking for a one-car solution that checks both the practicality and track-day-ready boxes on the shopping list.
Pricing: 2014 Subaru WRX STI Tsurugi Edition
Base Price (4-door): $38,195
Base Price (Tsurugi Edition): $41,495
Options: None
Freight & PDI: $1,650
A/C Tax: $100
Price as tested: $43,245
Competitors:
Ford Focus ST
Hyundai Genesis Coupe
MazdaSpeed3
Mini Cooper GP
Mitsubishi Evo
Volkswagen Golf R
Crash test results
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS)
