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I had an exhilarating and breathtaking experience spending a week with the Lexus IS 500 F performance. It is a V8 compact luxury sports sedan that makes 472 horsepower and 395-pound feet of torque. I spent a lot of time driving on I-270 West and on I-70 through the beautiful hills in Western Maryland. I drove on I-81 in Appalachia in West Virginia.
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Seeing the beautiful scenery and hearing the rich throaty exhaust note was healing. The IS-500F performance goes from 0 to 60 in 4.4 seconds according to Lexus.
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The paddle shifter was great. With the eight-speed automatic, I was able to downshift and upshift going through the mountains.
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The pleasure was mine. The model I drove was red. There are a lot of safety features. It also had paddle shifters and was mated to an eight-speed automatic transmission. I loved the 10.3-inch high-resolution touchscreen. I was able to listen to the music I made with the music department at Carnegie Mellon University.
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I listened to my song Paradise on the 17-speaker Mark Levinson system with 7.1 surround sound. The sound system was heavenly. It also has Apple CarPlay integration. The Lexus IS 500 F performance gets an EPA-rated 25 miles per gallon on the highway.
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Though my concern was not on fuel economy as I spent my week also driving around the Washington metropolitan area on I-495. I was really into the handling.
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It just felt tight, taught, and very responsive. It was exhilarating to drive. Overall the Lexus IS 500 Performance is one of the best compact performance sedans on the market.
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The base price on The Lexus IS 500 F performance is $57,575. Visit www.Lexus.com for more information.