Airslayer Vs. Gobstopper - The Ultimate Subaru Shootout?

This past weekend was the annual Goodwood Festival of Speed.  This year, Subaru of America, Vermont Sportscar, and Travis Pastrana got the invitation to bring the Airslayer to the timed shootout.  This is the wild and completely over the top STI that Vermont Sportscar built for Travis to drive in Gymkhana 2020 in his home town.

The car has an almost entirely carbon fiber body, a fully bespoke billet engine making around 860 horse power, and a completely unique transmission and drivetrain.  It is a very fast and very capable car to say the least.

If you haven’t watched the full Goodwood shootout, there is a link below:

And here is a link to one of Travis’s runs.

Spoilers, but Travis and the Airslayer put up a time of 46.20 seconds which was good enough for 2^nd place in the timed shootout.

That is a seriously respectable time.

But if we go back just a couple of years, there was a Subaru that was actually fast enough to win the timed shootout.

That car was Roger Clark Motorsport’s Gobstopper II driven by Olly Clark.

If you haven’t seen Olly Clark’s 2015 run in Gobstopper II, it is well worth a watch (Gobstopper's run is at 10:15 in the video), and here is a link to it:

In 2015, Gobstopper II put up a time of 44.91 seconds.  That is just about 1.5 seconds faster than Travis’s time in Airslayer.  Even though Gobstopper II’s engine and transmission are heavily modified, they are still based on the parts that Subaru designed that came in an STI from the factory, and that means something to some of us.  That makes what Roger Clark Motorsport did with Gobstopper II a bit more attainable compared to what Travis and Vermont Sports Car did with Airslayer.  

And to put that into further perspective, in 2014 Sebastian Loeb brough the Peugeot that he used to smash the record at Pikes Peak set a time of 44.6 seconds. 

Now, given that those two races were run about 6 years apart, the two runs are not entirely comparable because conditions were likely slightly different for each car.  But knowing how close the two times are, I think that every Subaru fan wants to know which of these cars would come out on top if they could run at the same event.

And let’s not forget that Roger Clark Motorsport has been working on Gobstopper III for a couple of years now, and that car is just about ready to start being run in competition.  Even though GS3 might be a bit closer to Vermont Sports Car’s Airslayer in terms of completely over the top custom parts, etc., I think that they are not designed for the same tasks.  Gobstopper III is clearly designed to set track records wherever it shows up, and the Airslayer is not quite as comfortable on a proper race track by comparison.

Click here for our full blog detailing the build of Gobstopper III

Click here for our interview with Olly Clark on the Flatirons Syndicate Motorsports Podcast

What I do know for sure is that we need to get together as Subaru fans, and start a campaign to Subaru of America, Vermont Sports Car, and Roger Clark Motorsport to try to get these cars together for a shootout.  We need to know how they stack up against each other, and I think that Subaru fans everywhere would love to watch that show.

I just feel bad for any of the other cars that come out to that event.

- Jon Cooley