Back in late 2021, Lexus announced a slew of electric concept cars, and one of them was the Electrified Sport Concept, a sleek sports coupe said to be an all-electric halo car to succeed the legendary LFA.
However, according to a report from Japanese publication Mag-X, this LFA successor could also potentially spawn a traditional ICE variant in addition to the pure EV version, and the engine it uses could be quite an interesting one.
Read More: Lexus Electrified Sport Concept Shows It Sleek Design On Video, Previews Electric LFA Successor
Back in 2018, Lexus unveiled an endurance racer based on the LC500 set to race at the 24 Hours of Nurburgring, and a year later they fitted it with an all-new twin-turbo V8 that was said to be a testbed for future production vehicles. Initially, it was speculated, and even somewhat confirmed based on prototypes floating around, that this engine would make its way into a high-performance “LC F”, but the project was reportedly shelved.
Now, Mag-X’s report claims that rather than a hotter LC, this engine could make its way into the second coming of the LFA as a substitute for the cancelled GR010 roadgoing Le Mans Hypercar.
See Also: Lexus Remains Committed To Low-Slung Bodystyles, Needs More EV Platforms
That being said, as exciting as this potential news may be, it seems like quite a reach given Lexus’ push towards electrification. On top of that, it was reported by none other than Mag-X themselves a year ago that parent company Toyota was allegedly stopping development of V8 engines, which is only supported by things like the Tundra and Sequoia ditching their V8s in favor of V6s for the latest generation.
In order for Mag-X’s new report to come true, Toyota would theoretically need to make financial sense of developing two separate versions of an all-new halo car, restart work on a cancelled twin-turbo V8 project despite reportedly stopping development of V8s altogether, and make it all work in a platform that was in theory only designed to be an EV (unless this was secretly the plan all along). Not exactly an easy feat for a car that will undoubtedly be sold in very low numbers.
Related: F… No! Lexus Says This LC Coupe Teaser Is Not An F Model But An Inspiration Series
However, should these talks of a twin-turbo V8 LFA successor turn out be true, it would certainly be the crown jewel of the performance renaissance Toyota/Lexus currently has going on with cars like the Supra, GR Yaris/Corolla, GR86, and IS500.
And if recent speculation is to be believed, the news could become official as early as next month. Seeing as the USA was the biggest market when it came to LFA sales, the leading theory is that Lexus could break the news at the Pebble Beach Concours D’Elegance, which would make sense given how many debuts they’ve done there in the past.
Not only that, but the original leaked Toyota/Lexus product launch roadmap from 2020 did have the LC F slated for a 2022 debut, so it seems only time will tell whether or not this new Lexus halo car will come to fruition.
