Lightning Lap 2017: Subaru BRZ Performance Package

Lap Time: 3:19.7
Class: LL1
Base Price: $29,660
As-Tested Price: $29,660
Power and Weight: 205 hp • 2822 lb • 13.8 lb/hp
Tires: Michelin Primacy HP, 215/45R-17 87W

If there were an award for the most manic engine among this year’s Lightning Lap contenders, it would, ironically, go to the slowest car—Subaru’s BRZ with the Performance package. Its flat-four screams a 7400-rpm riot, gear after gear, ultimately whipping itself into a frenzy that makes more noise than motion. Though Subaru hasn’t given the BRZ the much-needed power boost it deserves, it did fix the one glaring fault the car exhibited in its first Lightning Lap appearance in 2013—inadequate brakes.

Now armed with no-surrender Brembos, Sachs dampers, wider wheels, and five more horsepower, the 2017 BRZ was primed to be ever-so-slightly quicker than the 2013 model, which laid down a 3:18.6 lap four years ago. But then, as noted, it rained for two and a half days. And even after the course “dried” at the end of the first week, there were two unavoidable rivers of water running across the track at Spiral on Monday. They conspired to add 1.2 seconds to the BRZ’s time at the next set of corners, a deficit from which it could not recover.

Aside from the capable brakes, the BRZ’s other changes are so subtle that they go largely unnoticed. So the BRZ remains the Janus-faced sports car it has always been. And we love/hate it accordingly. We love its light weight, accurate steering, sharp shifter, and textbook rear-drive handling. But we can’t think of another sports car more in need of additional power and grip. It is, at heart, a momentum car, and one small mistake will ravage your would-be best lap. But perfecting the details in a car that’s as benign, ­predictable, and rewarding as this one is more fulfilling than it should be in a machine this modest. ­Especially now that it has the brakes to handle it.