These Subarus are some of the most successful extreme race cars in the country

subaru.com/rally

For car lovers, one of the most thrilling events to attend is a major rally race. 

These events involve drivers racing highly prepped race cars against time on insanely complicated courses.

Rally courses are on closed-off sections of roads and trails, usually located in rural areas and deep in the woods. The courses tend to be rugged and almost always require the drivers to do some serious off-roading. 

Recently, the Oregon Trail Rally took place right near Portland, Oregon. 

The event was part of Rally America, which is one of the biggest rallying events in the US. Rally America is hosting eight different national-level events in 2016 where racers can take their cars out on miles and miles of open rally stages and compete for the best overall time.

As it is at most rallies, dirt and rocks were sprayed everywhere, a bunch of very loud and incredibly fast cars were raced, and a group of talented drivers and co-drivers were going hard.

Subaru took the overall win with its top-class #75 WRX STI rally car driven by David Higgins and co-driver Craig Drew. Following them was the other pair of Subaru factory drivers, Travis Pastrana and Christian Edstrom in the #199 WRX STI rally car.

Here's a closer look at what makes these winning Subaru rally cars so special. 

Subaru's rally cars are built and maintained by Vermont SportsCar, a car modification company located in Colchester, Vermont.

Though the cars resemble their road-going versions, a ton has changed all around.

The rally cars have stripped interiors, roll cages for safety purposes, completely modified suspension, heavier-duty brakes, sequential motorsport transmissions, and a ton other modifications to make them rally-ready.

But even though they're changed in a bunch of ways, they still have horns, mirrors, lights and registrations that keep them street-legal.