The Coolest Hyundai In History Is This 300-Horsepower All-Wheel Drive Tiburon Rally Monster

American rally racing was positively booming back in the early 2000s. The SCCA Pro Rally championship evolved into Rally America, which brought manufacturer-backed entries from Subaru, Mitsubishi, Dodge, and Hyundai. Rally legends Travis Pastrana, David Higgins, and Ken Block ran the table, with Canadians Antoine L’Estage and Andrew Comrie-Picard picking up the scraps they left behind. I was a marketing intern for the series for a season, and had a blast living among the glory days of the sport. If you, like me, remember those times fondly and want to bring a bit of that early 2000s optimism feeling back to your life, you can buy Libra Racing’s Hyundai-funded Mitsubishi Evo-based Tiburon rally car right now on Bring A Trailer. 

There’s just something about a coupe silhouette with jacked-up suspension, a set of 15-inch Compomotive wheels, and meaty dirt tires that gets my heart rate going. The old-school Rally America graphics, the mid-2000s energy drink livery, and the roof scoop are all incredible. There’s so much here that gives me the nostalgia hit that I crave. I badly want to dump the clutch on a gravel road and get all four of those tires spitting dirt rooster tails. Is that too much to ask?

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Back in 2002, this car was the absolute height of rally technology. It had a Mitsubishi-derived all-wheel-drive system, a five-speed sequential transmission, a viscous center differential, Proflex adjustable dampers, AP Racing brakes, and enough power to keep up with the pack. While the Tiburon only ended up winning three rounds of the series back in 2002, and was never quite competitive with the Vermont SportsCar-built Subaru Rally Team cars, it’s still a piece of motorsport history that deserves to hit the stages again. Buy it and go rallying. You know you want to.

The Tiburon’s 2.0-liter Beta II engine was originally tuned to deliver just 138 horsepower and 136 lb-ft of torque. At the time, Hyundai was racing Accents in the World Rally Championship, making use of a turbocharged 2.0-liter engine. Apparently, the Korean special projects department built a “competition spec” engine block and stacked it with a bunch of WRC components, including the big Garrett turbocharger. All of that is capped off with Autronic standalone engine management and a claimed power output of over 300 ponies. 

Inside, you’ll find your typical rally car look with Stack gauges behind a Momo steering wheel, Recaro buckets, and the aforementioned dog box shifter. A hydraulic handbrake was added to initiate some nice, proper slides. There’s never been a cooler Hyundai, and the company is going to have to try really hard to beat this one.

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It’s a John Buffum-built, Antoine L’Estage-raced rally car, but this isn’t exactly a collector piece, so I don’t expect a bidding frenzy. You could likely pick up a really cool vintage rally car that could compete again with some mild upgrades. Or just buy it to run your regional SCCA Rallycross championship and be a real hero. And despite my enthusiasm, I probably won’t bid against you, but I’ll definitely be thinking about it. Included with the sale is a rally light pod for night stages, an extra set of wheels, and a complete truckload of spare components. 

I really thought rally was headed for a comeback in the U.S. again, but it sure doesn’t seem to be catching on like it once did. Maybe, just maybe, if you buy this car and light up the stages, you’ll get some fans back out into the woods.