2007 Lexus Es 350 Performance
Behind the Wheel | 2007 Lexus ES 350
If Driving Is a Pain, Here's Your Balm
YOU will never read a truly enthusiastic review of the Lexus ES 350. This is less a reflection of the car than of the people who write auto reviews.
The ES 350 is aimed at people who don't care about 0-to-60 acceleration and slalom speeds. The ES 350 demographic just wants something comfortable and quiet that won't break down and looks respectable in the driveway. So it makes no sense to talk about the ES 350 as if Lexus screwed up and inadvertently produced a car that is confidently capable yet strangely emotionless. That was exactly their plan. They hit their target, but their target wasn't people who care about cars.
As evidence of this, Lexus goes to the unusual step of building two sedans in the same general size and price range, each intended for much different drivers. Instead of trying to come up with one entry luxury sedan for all people, Lexus builds the IS 250 and IS 350 (in rear- or all-wheel drive) for the Bimmer intenders, and the ES 350 (with front-wheel drive) for people who secretly want a Buick.
The ES 350 is based on the Toyota Camry, which might tell you something about its driving dynamics. With its 3.5-liter, 272-horsepower V-6 and six-speed automatic, the ES 350 never feels as if it lacks for power. Smooth is the word that applies to everything from the ride to the way the transmission shifts gears. The conservative tires (215/55-17, if you care) are quiet, and their relatively tall sidewalls help to squelch impacts, in keeping with the ES 350's priority of refinement over performance.
On that front, Lexus may have gone too far in its quest to isolate the steering from any shudder or vibration — the wood-rimmed wheel feels a bit squirmy in your hands, as if the front tires' contact patches are screaming to tell you what they're doing, but someone's smothering them with a pillow.
People seem to have stopped griping about gas prices for the moment, but should a barrel of crude spike again, the ES 350 is rated at a respectable 21 m.p.g. in the city, and 30 on the highway. While the ES 350's kissing cousin, the Camry, comes in a hybrid version (rated 40 city, 38 highway), there is no corresponding ES hybrid.
The interior is where the ES really distances itself from its proletarian Toyota counterpart. The dark, soft-touch dashboard strikes a soothing contrast with the cream seats and walnut accents on the console and doors. High-society options include a rear-view backup camera, power rear sunshade and heated and ventilated seats.
Allow me a diatribe, however, against the trendy push-button keyless ignition. While it's nice to have the car automatically unlock as you approach, I still appreciate a conventional ignition switch inside. I don't particularly care whether I push a button or turn a key to start a car; I just want to know where my keys are.
Luckily, the ES 350 features a 1980s-vintage anachronism that comes in handy in this respect: The 14-speaker Mark Levinson sound system inexplicably includes a tape deck. Since nobody has played a cassette since around 1991, the tape slot makes an excellent place to stash the key fob while you're driving.
With a base price of $33,865, the ES 350 seems keenly positioned to tempt shoppers perusing entry-level luxury sedans. But the base price is misleading, because it excludes the $5,380 Luxury Package, which I'd imagine is one of those options that is so prevalent that you'd have to special-order a car to exclude it.
The Luxury Package includes most of the features you expect on a Lexus — leather interior, rain-sensing wipers, high-intensity headlamps, Bluetooth, heated and ventilated front seats, power rear sunshade, rear side air bags and a few other baubles. The Luxury Package's rear-seat panorama glass roof is a particularly nice touch.
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My test car also included intuitive parking assist ($500), navigation system, Mark Levinson sound system ($4,050), trunk mat, cargo net and wheel locks ($194) for a grand total of $43,989.
An ES 350, especially a loaded ES 350, is a very nice car. But I'm reminded of James Joyce's short story "The Dead." In it, a man's wife reveals that as a teenager, she had a boyfriend named Michael Furey who died of pneumonia after trying to visit her during a terrible storm. The husband dejectedly realizes that compared with this crazy dead guy, he hasn't brought much to the table in the way of passion. He's just going through the motions.
I wonder if an ES 350 owner wouldn't eventually have a similar epiphany. Maybe he or she would be driving along one day and suddenly remember a ride from the past, some rascal of a sports car that was fast and exciting but blew its final head gasket long before its time. Maybe that car instilled in them the idea that fun precludes reliability, that luxury and excitement are mutually exclusive.
So now they go the safe route. They prize dependability, resale value, fit and finish. It's been so long since driving was fun that they've forgotten that it ever could be in the first place.
But it doesn't need to be so.
I'd measure the ES 350 against the BMW 335i, the Cadillac CTS, the Infiniti G35, even Lexus's own IS 350. I want to see a bit of reckless exuberance in my $43,000 sedan, and any of the aforementioned vehicles will approach the ES 350's luxury factor while providing 300 percent more entertainment behind the wheel. However, as I stated at the outset, I recognize that my fundamental automotive worldview is deeply at odds with the ES 350's mission.
That said, if you look at your car as a means of escape from the world rather than a connection to it, this is your ride. It is a cocoon of tranquillity, and it will probably deliver many years of trouble-free transportation.
The ES 350 will never make you unhappy. Neither will it bring you joy.
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INSIDE TRACK: What to drive if you don't like driving.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/automobiles/autoreviews/28AUTO.html
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