[shadoh6]

The sky is a dark, murky gray. Rain has saturated every inch of the land, turning dirt to mud. Dedicated fans stand next to the rally track, awaiting their favorite.

Along comes a Yellow IS, decked out with a racing stripe and Lexus stickers. Taking the turn hard, it sends mud flying and comes within a few feet of the screaming fans. It's 215 horses quickly zoom it off.

Then comes the unmistakable double kidney car far behind the IS, and the crowd evacuates the corner which the IS easily handled...

Anybody else seen this commercial? I just saw it and I laughed my @$$ off!

 

[DonCorleone]

yeah its been on for awhile... ive seen it twice but didnt laugh cause i sounded funnier when ppl on this board described it...(it aired on the east coast before it headed west) and it hasnt aired much cause i watch a lot of tv and only saw it twice...

 

[chiem]

hmm.. never seen it.

--k

 

[IS300#1]

yeah, saw this commerical a fewe times, and there were some old post regarding to this topic a while ago..

 

[EricK]

Well I've never driven the BMW 3-series with the sports package (which I'm sure makes a big difference) but at the "IS300 driving event" I felt much more comfortable around the corners in the IS300 than I did in the 328i (w/out sports package) which had a lot more body roll.... Also I didn't notice the IS300 understeering the way the car magazine editors describe. So there is some validity to that commercial at least in comparison to the old 328i without the sports package.
Eric....

 

[ckolsen]

I did the Lexus autocross event, and also the BMW event last year, which had 328s and 323s with sports packages. Those cars handled terrifically, and much better than the BMWs at the Lexus event, so it's an unfair comparison.
As for the understeer, I didn't notice that either, I thought the IS300 was tail-happy if anything, and an absolute blast to drive. Of course my event was in torrential rains, so that could explain the oversteer.

 

[Daniel]

What I found out is that the IS understeer when you try to corner at low speed and have the transmission at its highest possible gear at that speed, but it start to feel loose when you take faster corners and use the right gears to corner. The comments from editors in the magazines are usually their opinions based on how the car feel in the skipad, which is driven at relatively low speed, and I don't think IS was tuned for such low speed.