[Rich]

I can tell you I went to the one in NJ. It was AWESOME!!! Where to start...

Inside:
I went to the morning one and they had water, juices, snapples, coffee, french toast, all sorts of good stuff to eat. There was a yellow IS on a pedestal for all to see/sit in/inspect. They had a transparent IS engine that showed moving parts. They had tables displaying Lexus accessories (watches, shirts, etc.). They had a bunch of chairs set up in front of a stage where they brought out the IS and the prototype hard-top (very nice, one of a kind hand-made from what I understand). I arrived a little late so I'm not sure if they brought out the A4 and Bimmer too. The inside of the tent was air-conditioned and also had amazing audio/video setup (provided by VH-1), very nice!

Outside:
They had two setups:
1) Single line to drive the IS300 on a sweet course (about 10-15 min wait). They had water and snapple by both setups. They also had personnel going up/down the line asking if anyone had any questions about the IS or driving course rules. I had heard that they would frown upon opening it up or basically driving like a maniac. When I got in the car and asked the girl what the rules were, she simply looked at me and said "Have fun!!"

2)Three separate lines under the second tent, one for the IS, the A4 and Bimmer respectively. They had about five IS300's and three A4's and Bimmers to drive. The IS was about a 8-10 minute line. The other cars were a bit more of a wait (less cars to go around). If you enjoy driving it was great, about 1/2 hour to end of tour most people were sick of driving and you could pretty much drive each car again and again w/ no lines.

You could crank the music as loud as you wanted to while driving (sweeet).

Then, about 45 minutes after leaving the tent presentation they switched the IS-only line to the Professional Driver Hot-Lap course. Here, you would don a helmet and go for a spin w/ a professional driver. That was amazing! Have fun, tell him not to worry about you and to feel free to open her up (they certainly did on my lap).

I don't know if anyone has mentioned it in this forum, but you MAY get some goodies before you leave (I don't want to ruin the suprise if you don't already know).

I have some digital camera images and Camcorder footage from the event. If I get enough requests I'll try and post them for you all. I got some footage of the Hot-Lap drivers tearing you-know-what down the track too.

BTW, after you leave try and refrain from driving your car out of the lot doing 100Mph (that's what we did).

 

[Rich]

I think you do have to leave. They closed up both tent lines and announced over the PA to beat it. Also, when you leave is when they ask you to fill out a questionaire and hand out the goodies that you may or may not get. They did seem to be a bit more of a pain in the three car line than in the IS-only line about being carefull. One guy lost it at the gravel-ABS turn and wound up facing traffic, another ran off the lanes and actually put it in reverse to correct (if you could believe that). That's when they told us to not do anything idiotic over the PA (but they were still really cool though). Maybe it was Jersey thing that they let us drive however (that's how most people drive on the roads anyway here).

I'll look for my footage and get the still images up ASAP.

BTW, they also had just about every other Lexus model on display outside by the tents to inspect/sit in (I did not see an SC though).