My first encounter of the Lexus LFA!

The Lexus LFA (supposedly stands for Lexus Fuji Apex), is one of my all-time favorite supercar. The real purpose behind the LFA is simply to change people’s perception of the Lexus brand. Mention the name Lexus and the first word that would probably come to mind is “luxury”, and then followed by the word “quality”. That is not necessary a bad thing when so many other car manufacturers are struggling to come even close to have such a reputation, but then never would someone associate the word “exciting” or even “sexy” with the Lexus brand either.

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Even the hood support rod is made out of carbon fiber

Lexus wants to become a more desirable car brand which will appeal more to the younger generation, and they have to start by producing something drastically different from what they usually make. A supercar. A supercar fit for a poster on walls of young boys’ bedrooms, and the performance to match its supercar looks. In short, Lexus want to create the perfect supercar. With Lexus’ slogan being “The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection“, it’s no wonder it took over 8 years to develop the ‘perfect’ LFA.

You pay for the immaculate Japanese craftsmanship

Of course, creating the ‘perfect’ supercar comes at a high cost and with only 500 customer cars made, each with a base price of a whooping 445,000$ (which is more than double the price of rival supercars with similar performance), Lexus still loses money on every LFA they sold. In which all 500 have been accounted for by the way.

However, you cannot put a price on desirability and Lexus’ huge gamble on the LFA had definitely paid off because most people will now associate Lexus with a supercar instead of beige, luxury sedans. With only 500 ever made for customers and not a single one of them registered here in Malaysia, I was pretty sure I would never encounter one as long as I am in this country. Oh how glad I was when I was proven wrong!

To most, the news of a brand new Lexus showroom is just as hyped as a new Toyota showroom. Clearly something really special is needed to bring the attention of everyone to their new showroom which would otherwise be overlooked. No surprise then, the presence of the rare LFA supercar did a good job of gaining attention of the media and car enthusiasts alike to the showroom.

Looks like a buff man flexing his muscular arms

And if you think that this could not get any better, this particular LFA is the pre-production prototype. Meaning this LFA is numbered 000/500 with a chassis number of zero as well. So technically there are 501 LFA made so far, but only 500 of them are sold to customers. The boss of the showroom had to pull many strings in order to convince Toyota to bring this LFA from the Toyota Museum in Japan to this showroom in Malaysia to be displayed for 2 months.

Carbon, carbon fiber everywhere…

In this case, pre-production should mean that this was made just like any other production LFA except that this has gone through many stringent tests, and possibly countless harsh miles under its sleeves to sniff out the tiniest defects and/or malfunctions that it may encounter. Seeing that this LFA has non-standard sport bucket seats, I’m pretty sure I was right about the latter.

Another highlight of this car is are the ‘F’ badges one on each side of the front fender. Yes all LFA have them but the ones on this pre-production prototype are gold-plated with genuine gold! Anyways enough of my words, allow the photos to do the talking.   

I am also an avid diecast model car collector, and my very first model was indeed a matte black LFA in 1:18 scale! I took this golden opportunity to bring along my precious LFA model to have some photos taken with its full-sized sibling. 

Am I the very first to have both the real LFA and its 1:18 scale model together in a photo-shoot? I sure hope I am!

Really hope you enjoy these photos as much as I did taking them. Be sure to stay tuned as I will attend more automotive events in the near future and you will not want to miss them. Hope to see you soon!