Honda Civic Type R vs. Toyota GR Corolla | Autoblog Podcast #778

In this episode of the Autoblog Podcast, Editor-in-Chief Greg Migliore is joined by Senior Editor James Riswick. They discuss our recent comparison test of the the Honda Civic Type R and Toyota GR Corolla before getting into reviews of the new Toyota Prius and Prius Prime, Lucid Air Touring, Chevy Colorado and Porsche GT3 RS. They also talk about the restructuring of Jaguar Land Rover before taking to Reddit, where someone is seeking advice on buying a 2023 Toyota Corolla Hybrid XLE or Acura Integra A-Spec.

Send us your questions for the Mailbag and Spend My Money at: Podcast@Autoblog.com.

Video Transcript

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GREG MIGLIORE: Welcome back to "The Autoblog Podcast." I'm Greg Migliore. We have a great show for you today. We're talking about the Civic Type R versus the Corolla, a battle of some pretty hot hatches. Shift gears a little bit, we'll talk about the Prius and Prius Prime, Chevy Colorado, Porsche 911 GT3 RS, and some loose and fun. We'll talk about the demise, sort of, of the Land Rover name, and we'll spend some money. So with that, let's bring in senior editor for all things West Coast. He hasn't been on the show in a minute because he's been driving literally everything up and down the West Coast. Welcome James Riswick.

JAMES RISWICK: Thank you. It's good to be back.

GREG MIGLIORE: It's been a while.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah, it has been. It took me forever just to find my microphone. I had no idea where it was. It's been so long since I've been on the podcast, so good to be back.

GREG MIGLIORE: All right. All right. Well, you've been driving a lot of interesting things. You did sort of a self-comparison test. Mark Takahashi, one of our contributors, helped you out a little bit because you need multiple people to drive cars. It gets a little hard when there's two cars and one human being and you want to get pictures and drive impressions. It gets complicated.

JAMES RISWICK: Yep.

GREG MIGLIORE: So you had a pretty good comparison test. You have a verdict. Which, if you've read Autoblog in the last month, you know what it is. But why don't you talk maybe about how this test went and initial impressions of each car.

JAMES RISWICK: Sure. So I went on the first drives for both of these cars. The GR Corolla was only on the track, and then the Type R was also on the track. We drove it a bit on the roads, but it was cold and rainy. So I only kind of drove the Civic Type R at full whack, and then the GR I only drove at full whack.

So there was a lot of question marks that arose in terms of what the GR would be like on real roads, and then, also, like how obviously the big bogey against it would be the new Civic Type R. And so we had them out in Malibu, drove them all on the pretty, winding mountain roads. And it was stunning how different the two are. And specifically, the GR feels smaller. And it's because it is smaller, but it's also just because it's livelier.

All of the controls, from the steering to the way it-- it does have that all-wheel drive system that can proportion a little more power to the back. Or it can proportion power to the back, period, versus the Type R. And in general, yeah, it just feels like a more fun, lively car, and I don't think we were expecting them to be just that different in feel.

The Type R almost feels Germanic in how just incredibly precise and poised it is. It even just looks more grown up in the best possible way now. And driving around the mountains, we were having more fun in the GR Corolla than in the Type R. You know-- and when you're out in the mountains and you're driving, it's really hard for you to tell, really, would I be quicker in the other car? It's just it's hard for you to tell, right? That's why stopwatches and racetracks exist.

And if you see everybody else's comparisons or drives that include track elements, the Type R is winning. Like, quite handedly, it's faster than the GR Corolla. But out in the real world it's a little harder to tell, especially when a car is-- there are certain cars, especially Germanic ones, where you are driving really fast, and it seems easy because the car is so wildly capable. It's kind of like the GTI Golf R thing for so long. It's so wildly capable it doesn't feel like you're going that fast. But oh yeah, you really are. That's what the Type R's thing is.

But the other thing with the Type R is, it comes down to the Civic being a better car than a Corolla. That goes from interior quality to interior space, specifically. It is a bigger, more-- and not like bigger like boat big. It's just a more practical vehicle for the day-to-day drive. It has a much larger, more functional trunk. And that's not just like, oh, I need to put a whole bunch of baby gear in the back. The Corolla's trunk is barely big enough-- barely tall enough to fit, like, full-sized paper grocery bags before the cargo cover crunches them.

So it's just a little more-- it is a little more comfortable because it does have the adaptive dampers. The GR-- actually, I was surprised at how fine it was in terms of ride quality in driving it a lot, as I did. That was the big question at the first drive, was we just didn't know how well it was going to ride. We kind of wondered if Toyota was hiding it from us by not letting us drive on the street, but it was actually totally fine.

So yeah, inevitably when we added it all up-- and even though we weighted it for fun to drive, driving enthusiast categories-- the GR just barely won those fun to drive categories. But everything else, the Type R kind of trounced it. And as a result, the victory goes to the Type R largely on the strength of its day-to-day drivability. And again, you look at these-- we could not drive it on a track, but those who have are showing the Type R is quicker, so I think the verdict is pretty strong there.

At the same time, though, they're both awesome, and both Mark and I kind of-- Mark decided he would pick the GR Corolla because he used to own-- he owns motorcycles and used to own a Lotus Elise, and he doesn't really care about the day-to-day practicality, he just wanted the fun car. Well, that's the GR Corolla.

And if I were just wanting a weekend fun car, you could totally get the GR Corolla because it is uniquely amusing to drive. Whereas the Type R is like, we own this and I can drive this every day. It doesn't matter. I could take the kids to school in this. It would be fine. Or I could own it for 10 years and I could go through a variety of life changes with this car-- it would be better for longer. So that was the verdict there.

GREG MIGLIORE: I would issue a concurring opinion that I would go with the Type R as well. When I remember when you filed the story, you were like, hey, take a look. Make sure we're not alienating half the readers, that type of thing. And I always like going over comparison tests in particular, just to see where people landed and what they liked and didn't like. And I agree with you. I mean, I think Type R is the winner. And I think the Civic is just the better car. I don't really think there's any-- when those are the bones you're working with, it's really not-- the Corolla maybe has two strikes against it already.

JAMES RISWICK: Mm-hmm. I mean, the other thing is, the all-wheel drive system on that car-- it's interesting because the Type R feels like the ultimate Civic. So it's like this ladder from a Civic Sport Touring, which is the hatchback with a manual transmission, the sport-tuned suspension, is great. It is so good. And it's better equipped than an SI that I would probably get the Sport Touring over the SI. It's just a little more, and it's just more tasteful, and I'd be fine paying less for that.

But you do have the step up from Sport Touring to SI to Type R. There is a progression here. The GR Corolla feels like what it is, which is a skunkworks thing that they took a Corolla and then Frankensteined it into this incredible machine. It does not-- it's a totally-- the regular Corolla hatchback is actually a surprisingly fine car. It's just this is just way, way beyond it. It is a totally different creature. So they're very different in that. And because of that, it kind of feels a little more special. Like, which one will be worth more in 15 to 20 years? I don't think there's any question it'll be the Toyota. But-- yeah.

GREG MIGLIORE: The Corolla kind of brings the interesting party trick, if you will, that's the three-cylinder to the table.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah.

GREG MIGLIORE: What did you think of that against the more traditional setup of the Civic?

JAMES RISWICK: Oh, it's so characterful. I mean, you have this growl, and then-- yeah, it is more powerful. It is more characterful. And you also have to-- the Type R has a really impressive mid-range in that engine where we were in the mountains and I could maintain pace just in a higher gear and in the 4,000 to 5,000 RPM range, whereas the GR I was in the upper rev ranges a lot more. That said, though, the Type R, it just really-- the amount of power it still has up high despite being turbocharged.

I mean, it's not screaming 9,000 like VTEC glory years, but it's still like a more broader power band. And again, they both have manual transmissions. They're both-- the Civic Type R is a little meatier in terms of its engagement point than the other Civics, which is good. But then, the Corolla's is really good. That has a more mechanical feel to it even though a little longer throws and the shifter is further away. Because the Civic's is very high, and it has that bring a glove shifter that will either be frigid or will sear the shift pattern into your palm.

So yeah, there's so much to like. And yeah, the Corolla has that all-wheel drive system, which is so cool. That's the story of the car. You put it on the track and you put it on that 50/50 setting, and that is quicker. The 30/70 introduces a little bit of looseness to it, which is really fun out in the mountains, and I certainly used it out there. It's not like I'm going to put it into ditch looseness or I'm going to be drifting a lot use.

It's just a nice little-- it kind of makes it feel that characterful, liveliness element to it. But if you want to go quicker, you put it in 50/50. And really, if they had this system in this Type R, it would be a all-star, hall of fame car forever. They've done wonders with front wheel drive, but if it had all-wheel drive, good grief. If they put this SH-AWD-- if the Integra Type S, if they could put SH-AW-- SH-AWD in it, holy cow. But they're not. So let's just leave that there.

GREG MIGLIORE: There you go. So you know what the GR Corolla strikes me as, is a modern day Mitsubishi Evo. Would you say-- would you agree with that? True or false, where did you land on that?

JAMES RISWICK: I don't know. Honestly, it's been so long since I drove the Evo.

GREG MIGLIORE: Still not burned into your head? You don't remember the rattling experience that it is?

JAMES RISWICK: Oh. Yeah. I think it's livelier than that car, but I honestly don't remember. I didn't drive them. That would-- yeah, let's just leave it there. I don't have enough memory--

GREG MIGLIORE: Yeah.

JAMES RISWICK: --of it. I like it better than the-- I did drive the STI more back then, and I did not like that car.

GREG MIGLIORE: Yeah.

JAMES RISWICK: It was the last hatchback STI. I don't think I've driven an STI since then, so it was a long time ago.

GREG MIGLIORE: It's been a minute. OK. I feel like I'm old enough that I don't-- the STI doesn't really do it for me anymore. I don't know. It's just-- it's a little harsher of an experience than I want in a car that is ostensibly supposed to be fun.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah. I have not driven the current WRX. However, I will be driving it. I have scheduled it for June when I will be driving it to the Integra Type S launch.

GREG MIGLIORE: Well, sounds like a pretty good trip. All right.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah. So we can see how those two-- they're not necessarily fully competitors, but it will be illuminating to see how they line up together.

GREG MIGLIORE: Maybe-- I don't know. People would read that, I think. I don't know, you know?

JAMES RISWICK: Oh, we'll see.

GREG MIGLIORE: All right.

JAMES RISWICK: [LAUGHS]

GREG MIGLIORE: Talking Toyota Prius, Prius Prime. I mean, the headline here is how handsome this car is.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah. Well, the GR Corolla-- platform-mates. The Prius and the GR Corolla, they're mechanically related.

GREG MIGLIORE: That's kind of wild when you just think about that.

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah, but so is the Toyota Sienna. So-- [LAUGHS]

GREG MIGLIORE: Well, yeah. That's true.

JAMES RISWICK: That's like the TNG [BLOWS RASPBERRY] the D platform version, but they're all kind of related anyway. So yeah, the Prius. Well, not only is it related, it's the same platform as before. So they fiddled with this and that, but effectively, under the skin, it's the same thing. Which is shocking because the old skin was revolting-- one of the ugliest cars of all time both in terms of detailing and just proportions. It looked just awful.

New one-- and it's not just in comparison to the old one. It's genuinely cool. I've since had the Prius here, just at home, and I always enjoyed looking at it. It just-- you know, people look my way, look at the back and Prius is written in big letters on the back now. And wait, that's a Prius? It makes a big difference, and it speaks to them recognizing that the Prius as a brand was faltering because anybody really strongly into environmentally conscious cars had abandoned it in favor of fully electric cars.

Now there's still an argument to be made for the Prius and having sky-high fuel economy, especially in terms of cost and also infrastructure. If you live in a condo or an apartment, good luck charging. So you might as well get 52 miles per gallon. But do you want the car that makes you want to barf when you look at it and just depresses you every time you drive it? No. Ergo, I'm not interested in a Prius.

So what did they do? They made it look wow, and then the driving experience-- you know, brace yourself, this is not-- it is not the GR Corolla, right? But it's no longer terrible. Toyota-- often, isn't standard operating procedure to have the last generation on hand for you to check out? But they did on this launch really drive home the fact of how bad the old one was and the new one is so much better. That goes from-- in particular, just steering effort and precision was just ridiculous before, and now is kind of normal.

There's even a sport mode that I drove in. And it's for me, but everyone else would be fine with the comfort mode. Far more poised to the suspension. The hybrid powertrain. Now this is a big development not just for the Prius, but for all of the Toyota hybrids moving forward, is that the electric motor stays on a little longer, and then the engagement when the engine kicks in is smoother and quieter.

So before you'd get on the throttle and very quickly that engine would come on, and you'd notice. It's still kind of drone-y because it has that electronic CVT on it, but it's now smoother and the electric power being greater early on is that much more appreciated. And this is something you will notice and will be rolling out as time goes on. The Corolla Cross hybrid, which is the first Toyota hybrid after Prius, that has the same thing. It's a little louder for reasons that we don't need to get into. But nevertheless.

So they've improved. The hybrid powertrain, its fuel economy is basically the same. So it didn't really make huge gains in fuel economy. But it is so much more powerful now, to the point that-- like, 0 to 60 times in Priuses, right, like, who cares? It's like three seconds quicker. It goes from like 9.8 seconds to 7.2. Something like that. Which is like a gigantic gap. Sorry, it's a gigantic improvement that everybody will notice. When you're accelerating onto the highway, you'll be able to get up there quicker and it won't make as much noise.

And then you have the Prius Prime. So that's the plug-in hybrid. That has 100 more horsepower than before. 100. Its 0 to 60 time went from 10.2 to 6.6. Holy cow, that's enormous by any scale. And 6.6 is legitimately quick. Now, it's still-- to do that, you can have a full battery for the electric range, but you whack the throttle to do that. The engine will kick in. It's still pretty loud because it's a small naturally aspirated engine and it has that droning CVT of Toyotas. But nevertheless, you're going to get there quickly, and it makes a big difference.

The other thing is its all-electric range has basically doubled from the 20 range into the 40 range depending on trim level. It's like 39 or 44. So you're going to be driving on electricity more. So that means it's that much more efficient because the more electric range you have-- specifically for plug-in hybrids it's a big deal because 22 versus 44 is a lot different than a full EV that's, like, 250 versus 270, right?

That 20 miles doesn't make that much-- but in a plug-in hybrid it does because if you're only driving 35-- let's say you drive 35 miles in a day. Well, in the old one you would have been burning gas. The new one you were not burning gas, ergo your fuel economy is, like, infinite because rarely is that engine coming on unless you, as I was saying before, give it full whack.

So from a driving perspective, new Prius, so much better than before. And obviously it looks a lot better. So there's nothing not to like in terms of its improvement. And the other thing is, it doesn't really have many competitors anymore. There's the Accord Hybrid, there's-- within its house, the Toyota Camry Hybrid. But those are bigger, quite different vehicles. And then there's the Kia Niro, which is probably the closest thing.

But that is also a more practical, SUV-like vehicle. I've tested it now. I've done my luggage test. It holds a lot more stuff and has a bigger back seat than the Prius. It's also a lot slower too. So it's an interesting position. Well, I'm really curious to see how it does because it is a far more appealing car, but have people just moved on to either crossovers in general or just full EV or bust? We'll see.

GREG MIGLIORE: To me, that's perhaps the most-- the biggest question right now about the modern day Prius is with everything going so electric in general, it's like this car no longer captures the zeitgeist, if you will, of how it did maybe 15, 20 years ago when Prius and hybrid were synonymous with driving a green car. So it'll be interesting. But to your point, it's still a car in a hatchback. I mean, nobody wants that anymore.

So I think that could be the bigger challenge facing it versus, you know, is there still a market for hybrids. Which is also a big question. I think it's going to be really interesting because Prius is such a calling card for Toyota. It's like, how do they make it even more relevant when you could argue that its time, in some ways, has passed? I'm not sure I would argue that. I've had a lot of conversations with people-- so I have a sidewalk by my house that goes straight into the woods, and it's rare that I have a car that somebody just walks by and has zero questions about.

And I get a lot of questions these days about electrics. And there's always some people that are like, no, no, electrics are wrong. And they're happy to tell you why. But there are a lot of people who are very into electrics, but they just like their car. And they're like, well, I don't know. I mean, my car is only four years old. I don't think I'm ready to go get a full electric.

Or, you know, I kind of like the idea of a hybrid, I'm sort of hedging my bets. It doesn't even have to be a political thing. It's just like people who might want to go electric at some point are still a little nervous about the infrastructure, and that's where maybe you do see people come back to things like their old friend the Prius. So I don't know. We'll see.

JAMES RISWICK: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it'll be-- and it's interesting because that is a very-- Toyota's going about it a very pragmatic way. They're like, well, most people like-- we're not fully on board with this EV thing for myriad reasons. But they're not fully on board because they do make the point, like, well, if the goal is to cut CO2, you're doing it greatly by going with a hybrid because even a Highlander Hybrid, the difference in fuel economy between the hybrid and the [INAUDIBLE] is gigantic.

So if you buy a hybrid instead of trying to shell out however much money for some future, you're still saving a lot of gas and not putting as much CO2. So that's a victory, right? That is a true thing. It's pragmatic. It's very sensible. So it's a sensible argument. But I think a lot of people will still be like, no, all or nothing.

We're going to go EV. We don't want to hear that. We don't need to be the sensible one. And then at the same time, the Prius is a more emotional choice now. So while embracing the sensible argument, they are also making you want it for more emotional reasons. So it's an interesting thing they're doing.

GREG MIGLIORE: Definitely. Yeah, it's funny you bring up like the Highlander. I had that conversation with two Highlander Hybrid owners recently who were totally open to electric cars, but this was easier. I could get one. I have this relatively long range. I don't have to think about filling it up electrically, if you will. So that's interesting, you know?

JAMES RISWICK: Yeah, and their choice of large crossover electric are rather small.

GREG MIGLIORE: Indeed. Indeed. So let's go full electric here on the podcast, and we'll shift over to Lucid. You and I are among the only people on staff who have driven Lucids. For me it's been a minute, but you've fairly recently driven one. This is just, to me, a very interesting car company. Their story is-- it's got a lot going on.

They've really played up the whole mid-century modern design, and then their numbers are just insane. I kind of wonder what kind of staying power are they going to have. But I was definitely impressed with the car I drove. This was not this fall, but last fall. But seemed pretty well screwed together. Aesthetically, it was great. It was quick. What did you think?

JAMES RISWICK: You know-- yeah, we could have devoted this entire podcast to the Lucid Air, honestly, because I have now not only-- I had the Touring for-- I can go into the differences. But the Touring is basically the mid-grade model. So I drove that for maybe five days, and I brought it home and I drove it more as a car. And then I went on the first drive launch, which uniquely-- usually on a first drive we go to some hotel somewhere and we have product presentations. And an engineer, maybe a designer will be there. But only just maybe.

For Lucid, I went to their headquarters in San Francisco, and I stood in their design studio, which is also shared with their engineering team. So I'm just in Lucid central and get this-- with the point being that I got to see a lot of the components that went into the car, and even could compare it to what-- the drive unit in the Lucid compared to what the drive unit is in, like, IONIQ 5 and EV6. The Ioniq 5 EV6 that Hyundai won, which is an impressive-- we're all fans of that car.

That thing looks like a small 1.4 liter internal combustion engine in size. But Lucid's tiny. Its motor looks like the size-- it looks like a toaster in comparison. And because of that, it's just a wildly impressive piece of engineering because although it's very small, it packs an immense amount of power and it's efficient. So if you look at the numbers at least, the Lucid Air produces 800 to 1,000 horsepower and is efficient as a Kia Niro EV.

It blows your mind what they were able to engineer out of this car. And that's why I mean I could go on about this car, because there's so many really fascinating engineering details that went into this. Like, they just went to create, like, a crown jewel. Like, let's fully embrace this from an engineering perspective. And then from a design perspective, much like a lot of EV makers, they were able to fully embrace the electric architecture. So they could play with proportions.

That smaller, tiny motor allows for a giant front trunk as well as the big, weirdly-shaped regular trunk. And that's why some electric cars do not have front trunks because their motor-- their stuff, right? Electric cars still have stuff, including a drive motor and motor control unit. And if it's bigger, like in a Hyundai or Kia, you have less space up front. So it all comes down to packaging. That's part of its engineering whiz-bangery.

Its batteries are really advanced, the way they can package them. And then, yeah, from a design perspective, this most recent event we were talking to the head designer, who was at Audi in their recent glory years. So let's say like 2008, when the Audi A5, S5 came out. And that A4, those really-- they couldn't really move on from them, that generation, as well as when Mazda got sexy. Like, those thereafter. And he was talking about as, like, building a brand from scratch-- how do we invent a brand from scratch when we don't have any history?

Because all these brands are building from somewhere else. And he recognized that most brands take something from where they are from. They even had this moodboard of, like, what is German things, and very precise instruments and, you know, German stuff. And then British cars, old dens with wingback chairs and British racing green. And then, you know, the Italians-- passion and Gucci things. And OK, we get that, right?

So what are we going to do? We're going to do California because we are California, and so we are going to create our own moodboard about what it means to be in California. And that means high-tech, Silicon Valley. As you pointed out, it means mid-century modern architecture. It means, to some extent, the color palette of the car. So trying to embrace that, which I think is very interesting from a design perspective and also creating a brand perspective. And it was almost like-- I kind of wish I could have recorded everything he said because it would have made a great podcast by itself.

But there's just a lot about this car that's fascinating. And it's one of those where if you don't mind someone coming up and asking, hey, what is that? And you enjoy talking about it because, hey, look what I have, and this is why it's really cool. It's not just like, hey, look at this fancy thing I own, but you actually like talking about why it's special. It's such a cool car to really do a deep dive on. It's just interesting.

Now that said, the week I came out with my review on the car, they had some big recall. And engineering a car and designing a car is a lot different than manufacturing one. And we definitely saw that with Tesla. We continue to see that with Tesla. So there are going to be teething things that you should expect. I did have some hiccups when I had the car. The automatic windshield wipers did not work very well. Could not get them to go fast enough.

Going through a tunnel completely just freaked the car out. The infotainment system-- so there's a lot of screens in it. But thankfully there is a bit of a firewall so that if the infotainment system crashes, you can still move the steering wheel, the mirrors and things. So that's smart. That's good. But there was a few hiccups. But there's hiccups in Teslas and people love them. There's hiccups in old Jaguars and people still love them. And there's hiccups in a lot of-- sometimes the cars you love the most are the ones that flaws are OK.

GREG MIGLIORE: That's true. That's true. I mean, hey, the E-Type was a nightmare and people still recall the quirks and challenges of it fondly. So, you know, we'll see. I was going over my notes of the Lucid, and the guy who drove the car before me-- I don't know if you know him or not-- it was comedian Jon Lovitz. I was--

JAMES RISWICK: OK.