In early 2015 I started becoming unfulfilled with my daily driver, a 2011 VW TDI Sport Wagon. While away on a work trip I started looking for a replacement and settled on a Lexus IS300. The car had alway appealed to me, and prices were reasonable at the time for my budget. I prefer 4-door sedans, the IS300 checked very well. I was also drawn to the HKS Altezza driven by Nobuteru Taniguchi (NOB) in the mid-2000s, having seen it up close at the 2007 FD Atlanta round.

I picked up my 2002 IS300 from Chicago in May 2015 with about 155,xxx miles and drove it home to Wellington, CO. Previous owners had installed H&R springs on Tokico Illuminas, an aluminum flywheel with an ACT clutch, and various interior and exterior cosmetic mods. Being a Midwest car, one of the H&R springs rusted through and they were replaced with Eibach Pro Kit springs as I didn’t have a solid plan for proper coilovers yet. The car had some tire wear issues to begin with, so a set of Figs rear lower arms were installed and the front #2 bushings were replaced with Superpros from Figs as well. 4 months after purchasing the car we received orders to Okinawa, so the car went into storage in December 2015.