Rowan Atkinson-owned Lexus LFA for sale
A national treasure, formally belonging to a national treasure...
Is there a more famous celebrity-owned supercar than the McLaren F1 once owned by Rowan Atkinson? Yes, there was Jeremy Clarkson’s very public love and (mostly) hate relationship with his Ford GT, the 250 GTO that Nick Mason picked up for less than £40,000 in the late '70s and Jay Kay with pretty much every car under the sun. But no one’s really managed to leave their mark on the legacy of a car quite like Atkinson did with the F1.
Of course, that’s mostly for the wrong reasons. He pranged his F1 not once, but twice, first by rear-ending a Rover Metro in 1999 before having a more dramatic off on the outskirts of Peterborough in 2011, the latter resulting in a repair bill reputedly totalling close to seven figures. Factor in the novelty of Mr Bean owning one of the fastest and most expensive cars on the planet, and you can see why the tabloids had kittens at the time. On the positive side, the fact he continued to drive the car on a regular basis (and evidently enthusiastically) even when values began to skyrocket, is proof if proof was needed that the comedy legend is a grade-A enthusiast.
Atkinson’s F1 went up for sale in 2013 for £8,000,000, a tasty profit for a car that had covered 41,000 miles and taken a fair beating in the process. Then, nine years later - according to our vendor - he’d go on to import the car we have here. In some ways, there are a lot of similarities between the LFA and F1. Both were engineered to the nth degree: Toyota subjected its supercar to the same stress and refinement tests it would with its regular Lexus passenger cars, which is in a similar vein to Gordon Murray’s obsession with weight saving. Toyota supposedly saw the McLaren F1 as the LFA's benchmark.
You’ll be familiar with what sets them apart, differences in engine position aside. Though the F1’s name is derived from the sport that McLaren has dominated on numerous occasions, the LFA arguably has more in common with an actual Formula 1 car. Namely, the 4.8-litre naturally aspirated V10 that, while not directly related to Toyota’s (admittedly quite rubbish) Formula 1 racers, Toyota engineered the exhaust system to deliver the same howl as an F1 motor, which was helped by a vertigo-inducing 9,000rpm redline.
Then there’s the lightweight carbon fibre reinforced polymer (or CFRP) monocoque, carbon fibre body panels and slippery design for a drag coefficient of cd0.31. Everything about the LFA was space age, although it was arguably overshadowed somewhat by the Bugatti Veyron’s relentless record-breaking. Not to mention the fact that the Lexus name hadn’t been established as a performance brand and that it cost £340,000 when new. Of course, it’s value has gone up a bit since then.
The good news is it’s far from the most expensive right-hand-drive LFA we’ve come across. It's not a leggy example like Atkinson’s F1, with only 3,000 miles on the clock. The car was originally registered in Japan in 2012, and was exported to the UK a decade later where it was apparently snapped up by the actor. The seller notes that there’s service history from its time in Japan and that it’s been seen to twice by Lexus's nominated LFA dealership since coming to the UK. All yours for £874,995. Not the seven figures we’ve seen some cars listed at, which is all the more surprising given its provenance. Hard to imagine many (if any) buyers optioned that interior colour combo, either, making this one even rarer - for better or worse.
However, if I were to buy this, it would be spending a month at the best interior trimmers in the land before I set foot in it. Looks like someone let Ronald Macdonald spec the interior!
Tedward did a great review on Youtube, it does sound amazing.
I still would though.
Worth every penny of the asking price, unless you can find the Nurburgring edition... (which will be even more expensive)
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