Jerry Seinfeld is famous for his vast Porsche collection. And his jokes, but his collection of some of the world’s most historic and rarest P-cars, which he stores in a hollowed-out three-story brownstone in New York City, is the envy of many a car guy. That’s why it may surprise some readers to know that despite having his pick of Stüttgart’s finest, sometimes he just chooses to bomb around in a Subaru.
“I love Subarus,” Seinfeld declares to hosts Matt Farah and Zack Klapman (35:05 timestamp) in a recent episode of “The Smoking Tire” podcast. The comedian reveals that he owns a Subaru STI S209, the quickest production Subie ever built. When Car and Driver tested one, they accelerated one from a 0-60 in 4.4 seconds and gripped a skidpad at 1.04 g’s. They’re rare, too, as only sold 209 examples were sold in the US, which is understandable for a $65,000 Subaru.
It’s not the first Subaru Seinfeld has owned, either. He mentions a WRX STI Type RA, which is an homage to the Record Attempt car that Subaru used to set records at the Nürburgring. We assume he’s talking about the 2018 model, the only RA officially sold in the US, but if he had a JDM one that’d be even more impressive. He sold his Type RA to get the more powerful S209, but also discloses what is perhaps the highest complement an owner can pay to a car — he recently bought it back a couple of weeks ago.
Seinfeld is “aware of” the 22B, and unlike most 22B know-ofers, could actually afford one. Perhaps he’ll go further back into the Subaru catalog someday. It’s not just that Subarus have a flat engine like Porsches. Seinfeld discusses how back in the day each carmaker reflected their country of origin’s culture in the machines they built. “There are precious few left that do it, and I think Subaru is one,” he explains. “They express their national character and the Japanese automotive character is fantastic.”
Like Farah, we were surprised. Despite his shilling for Acura and his whole “Comedians in Cars getting Coffee” sponsored by Honda’s luxury brand, we never believed he (or Jay Leno) actually owned one. But Jerry’s always been into slightly quirky, off-kilter cars. In Seinfeld the show, Seinfeld the character daily drove a black Saab and the establishing shots between scenes were a carspotter’s dream.
Seinfeld is known to be quite secretive about his car collection. If we were him we would’ve snapped up every single one of those background sports cars after filming. We wonder if there are any other Japanese gems hidden in that brownstone.
And as the scene fades out, cue that signature electric guitar jingle.
I love carspotting on that show. Does anybody remember that episode where they were in the underground parking that was full of new Geo Prizms of all different colors?
Thankfully, its deeply coincidental that this one is also posted in Jeremy Clarkson’s birthday (today) as JC is also a car lad (what British thinks of the word guy as one with capital G like Guy Ritchie for ex. is a common first name in UK), as he also considers himself as being not a fan of Japanese cars as it goes the same to American cars (Subaru, Honda, Mazda and Nissan for examples are more American and Nissan too owned Subaru from 1968 to 1999), and tomorrow is Carlos Sainz Sr.’s birthday too, as the former World Rally Championship driver and father of current Formula One (F1) racer with the same name (as Carlos Sainz Jr.) was also a Subaru pilot but that stint had only ran for two years beginning in 1994 – just a year after (1993) he drove a privately-entered Group A Lancia Delta that only led to him (Sainz Sr. finishing seventh at the drivers’ championship table) – and ended in 1995 at the same time Toyota was banned in WRC until the rest of 1997. (Therefore his departure from Subaru led to Sainz Sr. attempting to drive a privateer Gr. A Toyota Celica T20 / ST205 in the same way he drove a Gr. A Delta that just decommisioned itself near the end of 1992 for 1996 but due to impact of Toyota’s prohibition meant he opted to join Ford for that season until 1997 as the rest of Sainz Sr.’s career was were history until he retired from that motorsports series in 2005 in favor of Dakar.)
Speaking of Sainz Sr.’s eponymous son and the series he (Sainz Jr.) is currently racing in, I think with this article also suggests about a celebrity (like Jerry Seinfeld which he would have been less important in half of Europe and other parts of globe as he’s a North American / US celeb hence comedian and half of European celebrities are generally not known to have a comedic / humor-centered sense) having a car collection but keeps it in secret, I would even notice that if Kaya Scodelario (British actress who is known for Effy Stonem in Skins UK and recently in Senna and The Gentlemen as Susie Glass) were called as “Kaya SKODAlario” (Skoda is a carmaker from Czechia / Czech Republic and is owned by Volkswagen) therefore she would’ve been seen driving cars from carmakers that deeply substitutes Subaru and half of its fellow compatriots (half of which like Subaru are currently part of Toyota such as Daihatsu, Hino, Mazda, Suzuki and Isuzu) in the European market, as it may suggest that with Subaru being profoundly overlooked and even placed with silence there, this means they’re (Subaru and rest of its fellow compatriots) instead not just alternated (altered) by that of Skoda and Seat there but also Renault Group (Renault itself and Dacia in particular) and Stellantis formerly known as PSA Peugeot Citroen and Fiat SpA later Fiat Chrysler Automobiles… (Kaya S. isn’t the only non-US celeb who may have a car collection, but also fellow Europeans / Brits Stacy Martin, Jodie Comer, Lucy Boynton etc..)
Yes