A late night shakedown and track familiarization run ahead of the start of the Nürburgring 24H race ended with Toyota dealing with a damaged Lexus LF-A. No official reason was given for the accident, but while the team was dealing with the busted front bits and torn up tail, the sneaky spies at KGP got down to work. The stealthy photogs snapped off some clear-as-day shots of the V10 engine, stripped down interior, suspension, carbon fiber under body tray and some very C2 Corvette-like door handles. Of course, this being a race car, we can only take hints from this set up, as it's been prepped for the track, but what we can do point and laugh at the car's lap times.
According to the spy report below, after repairs to the damage from the late night crack up, the LF-A did start on the grid as planned, but only managed a best lap of 9:19.757. Shoot, a newby at the wheel of a Cadillac CTS-V could have bested this car (we know race traffic probably played a roll, but we retain the liberty to compare apples to oranges).
Lexus' race-prepped LF-A prototype crashed during their final late-night preparations and qualifying, before the start of the Nürburgring 24-hour race. The incident damaged the car, and squelched Team LF-A's efforts to familiarize themselves with driving night-time laps on the 'Ring. No specifics were available on the circumstances of the crash (did we say it was really, really dark?), but the LF-A limped back to the pits with damage to its lower front fender, and a serious gash to its rear quarter—both on the driver's-side. The damage was serious enough to force Team LF-A to load the car onto a flat-bed and leave the pits, in favor of Toyota's off-site 'Ring workshop used during the industry testing periods.
As the team was preoccupied with their banged up prototype, our shooter managed to scoop some revealing looks at some key LF-A details, including the LF-A's V-10 engin. In addition to what we engine shot, we also managed to get our best interior shots to date. Once again, despite the stripped-down nature of this race car's innards, the interior still shows some key details that point to the production-spec interior. And as reported earlier, the interior will clearly take major cues from the last LF-A concept from Lexus. Other interesting details gathered during Team LF-A's post-crash scramble to assess the damage: the LF-A's lovely carbon-fiber aerodynamic undertray, the operation of the car's horizontally-mounted door handles, and the car's Brembo brakes and front suspension set-up.
Team LF-A sources said that, in order to recover from the crash, they managed a mere two-hours sleep to get the car ready for the race the next day. The LF-A managed to make the starting grid, but within the first hour of the race the car began smoking from the rear, forcing a pit stop. The diagnosis was oil leaking from the transaxle, and a two-hour fix was required to get the LF-A back under way. At that point the LF-A had little hope of climbing the leader board. Amid varied reports on the LF-A's final results, our sources tell us that the Lexus covered 106 laps, and a best lap of 9:19.757 on lap 85. The LF-A's performance was good enough to finish in 120th place overall.