Sometime last week, a new leaked picture emerged on the SupraMKV forums that showed a production-ready Toyota Supra totally barren of any camouflage. Unfortunately, the silver example had already been reversed into a transport trailer thus only its front end was visible for a sneaky photog to take advantage of.
This is the first real glimpse we have had of the upcoming sports car, and since the Japanese automaker themselves have been running through teaser after teaser as the car’s worldwide official debut at the Detroit Motor Show in January 2019 nears, something that was confirmed only a few weeks ago, it’s nice to see something more concrete for a change.
The single image shows a Supra that’s presumably in its higher trim level, but nonetheless corroborates a narrative that many have already assumed: that the car’s overall exterior pretty much a dead ringer for the one wheeled out at the Goodwood Festival of Speed earlier this year.
During its brief appearance in the UK, neatly covered with a distracting silver and red wrap, the numerous photographs that emerged managed to capture the finer points of its exterior details to extrapolate a fairly accurate visual composite. And this is proved by this new leaked photo.
We see many cues taken from the Toyota FT1 Concept from 2014 and the GR Supra Racing Concept as well as other touches such as the bubble roof and deep set headlights. Interestingly, there seem to be vents located at the far corners of the bonnet. Given its placement, it’s unlikely to be used to dissipate air pressure in the wheel well and so is likely there for some cooling related purpose.
As we have already known for some time, the Supra shares a common platform and powertrain package as the third-generation BMW Z4 roadster with which it was co-developed. While the Munich corner had already revealed their car back in March, Toyota is clearly more keen on taking their sweet time with the Supra.
The rear-wheel driven coupe will launch with a ZF 8-speed automatic transmission plucked from the Z4, but a manual transmission option will be added within the car’s first model year. Powering all Supras will be BMW’s B58 3.0-litre inline-6 turbocharged petrol engine which should be good for at least 240kW and 450Nm.
For more on Toyota cars, check out our Showroom.
