Ralliart’s future: 2024 Mitsubishi Triton Ralliart imagined

Lancer Evolution, Pajero Evolution, Galant VR4, 3000GT, and Magna Ralliart are but a few cars that put Mitsubishi on car enthusiast’s maps in Japan’s golden era. Rally heritage, groundbreaking drivetrain tech, and go-anywhere toughness became the brand’s signatures as a result.

Without those models, or the budget to develop a niche sports car, Mitsubishi's performance agenda has shifted in the modern era. At the helm of Ralliart’s revival is Hiroshi Masuoka, not only a vice president in Mitsubishi, but a successful Dakar racer having won the gruelling cross-country rally twice in Pajeros.

Masuoka-san admitted he would love to see Ralliart variant at the top of every Mitsubishi model’s line-up. He also reiterated that an “almighty” tri-motor plug-in hybrid Outlander Ralliart is in testing (see renders below).

We know what Ralliart can do to the brand, and how it will elevate the brand... I'm not saying Ralliart is going to be what it was in the past – I think it'll be very different.

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“Last year we started Ralliart’s comeback… we studied, again, for some ideas of the brand's evolution and I hope to develop special parts, and more sporty parts for Triton, Outlander, Pajero Sport, and maybe even Eclipse Cross in the future,” said Masuoka.

Aside from Outlander, the next-gen Triton ute will be an ideal platform for Ralliart's expression; especially given a near-production MQ Triton beat heavily modified Toyota Hiluxes to win last year’s AXCR championship, as Masuoka-san boasted.

“My personal idea is that we have a ‘top grade’ Ralliart special model, and then a Ralliart version of Mitsubishi production cars”, continued Masuoka-san, though he stopped short of defining the kind of modifications that will define Ralliart products.

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Mitsubishi Ralliart speculative render | Wheels Media

Triton Ralliart rendered!

Following our first glimpse of next-gen Triton with Mitsubishi’s XRT, we’ve put together a pair of renderings imagining a hotted-up Ralliart variant.

A rival the Ford Ranger Wildtrak X, Toyota HiLux GR Sport, and Nissan Navara Pro-4X Warrior, we hope to see chunkier off-road tyres, lifted suspension, a beefier front bumper, and pumped guards.

From the sounds of it, Ralliart could even go as far as adding power – in the vicinity of 10kW/20Nm, just like the AXCR racer. If a new-gen Ralliart Triton comes to fruition, it’s likely to be developed in-house by Mitsubishi, not an Australian second-stage manufacturer.

Jordan Hickey

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Mitsubishi Ralliart speculative render | Wheels Media

What do the suits think?

It’s little surprise that Masuoka’s passion and excitement for Ralliart is palpable, but he has to answer to suits and shareholders; the exercise must be profitable.

John Signorello, a self-proclaimed car enthusiast, former CEO of Mitsubishi Australia, and current executive at MMC is a champion of the Ralliart program. He’s someone who sees value in building the halo brand – and the excitement seems to be pulsing through Mitsubishi as a whole.

“We know what Ralliart can do to the brand, and how it will elevate the brand, so our job and our regular discussion is: how do we use our heritage?”

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The AXCR Ralliart Triton in the heat of competition

“I'm not saying that [Ralliart] is going to be what it was in the past – I think it'll be very different – and that's the study that's happening. That's the regular discussion that's being had,” said Signoriello.

“We have a very healthy discussion internally… before, we were not focusing on such a brand, we were more concerned about profitability. But now, we are discussing Ralliart, which means that we are very much focused on ‘the brand’,” Koichi Namiki, general manager product strategy division told Wheels.

Both Toyota and Hyundai have found mojo in their performance brands – GR and N respectively – so, providing Mitsubishi nails the formula, hope is there. To give context on Ralliart right now, it has about 20 employees, making it half the size of Toyota’s GR program.

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The XRT Concept previews a hardcore next-gen Triton

The winning performance brand formula isn’t to only build expensive, niche products. A Ralliart flagship would give Mitsubishi licence to introduce aspirational variants that offer greater profit margins without diluting the brand – think GR Sport for Toyota and Hyundai N Line.

Though Australia has recently stepped up to a key market for Mitsubishi, the carmaker has to balance our small but mature sales space against less-developed, high-volume ASEAN markets identified as key growth regions. It’s a tricky balancing act.

One thing is certain: a stickered-up Ralliart Triton with few mechanical changes won’t be enough to impress Australians. Ralliart needs to offer more, it needs to go at least as far as Nissan and Premcar did with the Warrior program.