Lexus looker heads to Goodwood
The Lexus Electrified Sport concept is the successor to the LFA, and will be on display at Goodwood
Remember the Lexus LFA? The supercar with a Yamaha-developed soundtrack courtesy of its 4.8-litre V10 that revved – oh so quickly – to 9,500rpm? Well it’s back, sort of, and you’ll be able to see it for the first time outside Japan at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. Before you get too excited, though, you won’t hear much from it. Yes, like the new DeLorean MB wrote about yesterday, the latest interpretation of a Lexus supercar will be an EV.
Yet, rather like the Colonel’s secret recipe, the Lexus Electrified Sport concept promises ‘the secret sauce’ and ‘the performance cultivated via the development of the LFA.’ It’s the most interesting (so far) entry on the company’s all-electric to-do list. A high-performance sports car for the future that's part of a 16-model line-up of Toyota and Lexus EVs revealed by the company back in December last year. Being a concept you can take the few numbers quoted with a pinch of salt. These include standing-start to 62mph acceleration in the ‘low two-second range’ and a ‘cruising range of more than 430 miles.’ Lexus is hoping to use a solid-state battery to realise that claimed range – a technology it’s pressing ahead with developing.
Predictably, Toyota's early investment in electrification is continuing to pay dividends; the giant carmaker reckons it will have sold 3.5 million BEVs by 2030. Lexus is aiming for a "100 per cent battery electric mix in Europe, North America and China by 2030", with carbon neutrality in factories not far behind. By 2035, all Toyotas in West Europe will be zero emissions.
How you greet the Electrified Sport’s driveline will depend on how you feel about EVs in general, but there’s no questioning (from our side at least) that it’s a looker – like a Supra that’s been fed on a diet of raw eggs and beef. And Lexus does have a habit of producing cars that look like the concept on which they're based, so fingers crossed…
If you want to see it, head to Goodwood’s Electric Avenue, which the area dedicated electric vehicles.
When a car looks like that and goes like s
t off a freshly greased shovel...I'm enthusiastic alright! Even then, possibly the most exciting thing is that they're still hopeful about using solid state batteries. For all that EVangelists like to paint EVs as bleeding edge tech they are still reliant on carting a sodding great heavy battery about that takes a long time to charge...solid state could make today's EVs look as outdated as current EVs do ICE cars. Very interested to see how this develops.No real sound, little input from the driver and enormous performance. Yeah I know the next gen EV's will walk all over most ICE cars on performance, straight line at least, but it's a shame so much of the driver involvement is lost driving a high performance golf cart.
Don't get me wrong, I have had some real fun in an EV golf cart, but its not as involving as a manual ICE car.
But that won’t be what it looks like if at all….. I remember the new supra prototype that looked awesome and real one was diluted
Also ‘hopes to use solid state battery’….. in same way I ‘hope to be a billionaire’
That aside, may as well embrace it and be glad manufacturers are trying to make something interesting amid all the early turgid SUVs.
A good example was the roll out of apple carplay. It took Lexus about a year to retro fit a software update to a 2019 model, and 4 hours with a dealer to install. Tesla send updates while you are asleep.
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