When Lexus launched its first generation IS sedan, it had BMW’s 3 Series firmly in its sights. I don’t suppose it is any accident then that BMW is still being closely tailed as the IS range is expanded.

To prove the point, Lexus has just released details of the IS250 C, a folding hardtop version of the [...]

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Take one smallish sedan, drop a thumping 5.0 litre V8 in the snout, give it hard-core handling and tough, out-there style… been done before? Yup. But Lexus does it again and gives us its own howling ‘Hound of the Baskervilles’, the IS F.

It can be an exercise in futility splitting hairs over the performance margins [...]

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Just picked up the astonishing Lexus IS F. With a grunt-filled 5.0 litre V8 crammed into the tight IS250 engine bay, and with 311kW and 505Nm under the toe, the first impression is one of a seriously quick car. The eight-speed auto (yup, eight) with ’sport’ mode and paddle shifters also points to a high [...]

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Some things are just plain wrong. Like pineapple on pizza. Like bicycle pants. And like putting “BMW” and “bargain” in the same sentence. That’s gotta be wrong. So what’s going on with the BMW 125i Coupe? Who ever heard of a BMW-badged two-door coupe, a growling three-litre straight six in the snout (like we’re talking [...]

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Move over CLK Cabriolet and 3-Series Convertible, there’s a new player in the luxury drop-top game and it ain’t a German. Lexus debuted its new IS 250C hard top convertible at the Paris Motor Show and has followed up with an Asia Pacific unveiling in Sydney. With its attractive top-down aesthetics, aluminium folding roof and [...]

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UPDATE: We’ve added the Japan-market television commercial to the post. Click through to view.

Facelifts are a natural part of the course of life for every model of car, sometimes resulting in extensive visual changes inside and out (such as with the Holden Commodore VT through to VZ models), and other times with barely discernable alterations. 

For [...]

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Lexus’s IS-F is without doubt the brand’s performance flagship (at least until the LF-A arrives), but the presence of this taped-up prototype at the Nurburgring yesterday has already generated plenty of speculation on not only what this car is for, but also what level of performance lurks beneath its skin.

While it has an oddly-bulging [...]

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