The Lexus LFA, but why?
The Lexus LFA had a long drawn out birth and a sudden death, it was once a concept showstopper and now it is little more than a forgotten masterpiece.
We first caught sight of it in 2005, it had a V10 engine that was intended to evoke the Formula 1 exploits of sister brand Toyota while also breathing some excitement into premium brand offshoot Lexus. When the car eventually hit the market the Toyota F1 team were established underachievers and even today we still primarily associate the Lexus brand with worthy hybrid saloon cars, which begs the question, what was the point?
The Lexus LFA wasn’t even the best V10 engined road car that was linked to an underachieving F1 project. The 2000’s also brought us the Porsche Carrera GT hypercar and the E60 BMW M5 super saloon with those love or hate Bangle angles, both characterised by their high revving V10 engines. These road cars may have outshone the Lexus LFA but a Porsche V10 never even made it to Formula 1, while BMW entered but failed to meet either their own expectations or those of their partner Williams, leading to a tragic breakup and the instigation of a new BMW project with Sauber. Toyota managed five second places and a reputation for qualifying faster than they could race (remember the Trulli train?) during a tenure that ran from 2002 to 2009.
So the LFA was intended to reflect the gloss of Toyota’s F1 pedigree back onto the road, act as a halo to the rest of the range, generate excitement and ultimately sales. The strategy was confusing though, because the badge on the front didn’t say Toyota, it said Lexus. It seemed that after two decades spent building up a standalone recognised premium luxury brand, Toyota suddenly wanted to you to think of a Lexus as a ‘posh Toyota’. And it was a megabucks sports car, from a brand that was best known for premium hybrid saloons and had recently successfully launched its first SUV.
The car that arrived in 2009 cost £340,000 and could reputedly reach 202mph, it had 552hp and an impressive 9,500rpm red line on the tacho. It still had a V10 engine, a bespoke design for the car rather than one with a direct link to the Toyota F1 unit. The relevance of the V10 had dissipated since Formula 1 had switched to V8 power back in 2006 and Toyota finally withdrew from the sport at the end of 2009, in the midst of the global financial crisis and with very little ink in the record books in return for their significant investment.
But the LFA’s looks outshone these marketing blunders, it was distinctive while also clearly a member of the JDM cohort. The looks had matured when compared to the sleek 2005 concept and there was an over familiarity thanks to that never ending exposure in the years between concept and production, but it still turned heads with it’s straight edges, triangular motifs and B pillar scallops. These have since become Lexus design staples and have been applied ever more aggressively to those models that were launched as the 2010’s progressed.
The interior was also far from the Lexus standard, there was even a digital tacho that would light up green before flashing red to demand an upshift from the driver. Incidentally the gearbox wasn’t the LFA’s strongest suit, a single clutch semi automatic at a time when many rivals had already moved onto a quicker shifting dual clutch installation.
That front mounted V10 with its energetic scream is the lynchpin of the driving experience, with a heavier front end the LFA may not be as agile or quick as a contiguous mid-engine supercar but few of them can compete when it comes to aural excitement and straight line thrills as you bang in those changes, pulling back on the cold alloy paddle shift when the tacho flashes red.
Was the LFA a success for Lexus? We have established that it set the future design direction, and you could argue that Lexus have grown the ‘F’ brand on the back of it, but perception remains a long way behind the equivalent fast divisions of their German competitors. Internet rumour also suggests that Lexus haven’t yet sold the 500 cars they made and will still sell you a brand new LFA, eight years after production ceased. The LFA didn’t have the brand impact that Lexus hoped for, it primarily registered amongst car enthusiasts and even that recognition is fading as time passes.
And for Toyota? There has been increasing success in both WEC and WRC since that 2009 F1 departure and they have already committed to the new WEC Hypercar regulations for the 2021/22 season.
Ten years on it seems that there is a familiar brand quandary though, that forthcoming Hypercar is the spiritual successor to the LFA, but should it be a Lexus or a Toyota?
Despite the continuing investment, neither is a brand that the public readily associates with performance.
NOTE: The author’s impressions of the car are based purely on those gained by driving it on the video game Forza Horizon 4.
