Something interesting happened in 2012. Lexus, which had long shown inklings of developing sporty cars, started building them. Competent, luxurious, but otherwise ho-hum sedans suddenly had a little spice, and you didn't have to buy an IS F or an LFA to get it. Cars that sold in greater than triple-digit numbers were now fun to drive.
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One of the first places we saw the change was in the final years of the old IS. The test bed for the emerging F Sport trim line, the old IS was treated to a number of handling and steering improvements that made the Silicon Valley middle-manager's special actually fun and engaging to drive. For 2014, those improvements came baked into every IS along with an all-new and all-controversial look.
We asked Lexus to send over a 2014 IS 250 in Atomic Silver. It comes standard with a 204-hp, 2.5-liter V-6 that doles out 185 lb-ft of torque through a six-speed automatic transmission and 17-inch aluminum wheels wrapped in all-season tires. Other handy standard features include HID headlamps, a sunroof, 10-way power driver's seat, eight-way power passenger seat, and 10 airbags. Throw in Bluetooth phone connectivity and audio streaming, along with satellite radio and HD radio, and you've got a pretty good starting point.
Long-term comparison: I drove the <a href="https://thefappenings.netlify.app/cars/bmw/">BMW</a> 328 for 12 months. Now I try its Japanese rival for a year.
We spec'd only three options. The first is the $2085 Navigation Package, which includes nav, a backup camera, voice control, the Remote Touch infotainment controller, and the Lexus Enform with App Suite software, which allows you to run apps from your smart phone like Yelp and Pandora on your infotainment system. We also picked up the Intuitive Parking Assist parking sensors ($500) and a cargo net for the trunk ($64). All told, our IS is $39,494 as it sits.
There's one more thing, though. Lexus would really like us to sample the whole IS line, so this IS 250 will live with us for a mere four months rather than the customary 12, at which point it will be replaced by an all-wheel-drive IS 350 for four months and then an IS 350 F Sport. That'll give us plenty of insight as to what the new definition of IS is.
Were you one of those kids who taught themselves to identify cars at night by their headlights and taillights? I was. I was also one of those kids with a huge box of Hot Wheels and impressive collection of home-made Lego hot rods. I asked my parents for a Power Wheels Porsche 911 for Christmas for years, though the best I got was a pedal-powered tractor. I drove the wheels off it. I used to tell my friends I’d own a “slug bug” one day. When I was 15, my dad told me he would get me a car on the condition that I had to maintain it. He came back with a rough-around-the-edges 1967 Volkswagen Beetle he’d picked up for something like $600. I drove the wheels off that thing, too, even though it was only slightly faster than the tractor. When I got tired of chasing electrical gremlins (none of which were related to my bitchin’ self-installed stereo, thank you very much), I thought I’d move on to something more sensible. I bought a 1986 Pontiac Fiero GT and got my first speeding ticket in that car during the test drive. Not my first-ever ticket, mind you. That came behind the wheel of a Geo Metro hatchback I delivered pizza in during high school. I never planned to have this job. I was actually an aerospace engineering major in college, but calculus and I had a bad breakup. Considering how much better my English grades were than my calculus grades, I decided to stick to my strengths and write instead. When I made the switch, people kept asking me what I wanted to do with my life. I told them I’d like to write for a car magazine someday, not expecting it to actually happen. I figured I’d be in newspapers, maybe a magazine if I was lucky. Then this happened, which was slightly awkward because I grew up reading Car & Driver, but convenient since I don’t live in Michigan. Now I just try to make it through the day without adding any more names to the list of people who want to kill me and take my job.
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