This mysterious Lexus was spotted blasting around the Nurburgring yesterday, prompting a flurry of speculation on what it actually is. Although it has a curiously bulging bonnet, It’s certainly not an IS-F - the rest of the bodyparts are the same as those found on an ordinary IS250, and if you watch the video after the fold you’ll notice the aural absence of the IS-F’s throaty V8.

Instead it sounds quieter, more like a V6. It could still be naturally-aspirated, but it even seems too quiet for that. My money’s on either a turbocharger or a hybrid system being strapped to the IS250’s 4GR-FE, or even the 2GR-FE of the IS350. A hybrid system is the more likely candidate though, as Lexus and parent company Toyota have made no secret of their intent to extend their range of hybrid vehicles - currently the IS and the SC are the only cars in the Lexus stable to go without the fuel-saving and torque-multiplying system.

The body too thows up its fair share of mysteries. While the body is standard IS fare, the white-into-blue paintwork definitely isn’t, and neither is that pro-spec Recaro bucket and that full roll cage. Is it a demonstrator vehicle, a drivetrain hack or a prototype race car? We’ve got no idea, but we’ll be keeping a close eye out for any further developments.

UPDATE: Mystery Solved!

Well, it seems we were both right and wrong about this car. Yes, it was a race car, no it’s not a hybrid. In fact, it’s not even anything special. What you see before you is nothing more than an IS250 in racing trim. The car is TME/Team Gazoo’s entrant in the ADAC endurance racing series and it competes in the SP5 category for cars with engine capacities between 2 and 2.5 litres. Don’t let the fancy paintwork and rollcage fool you though: this car isn’t really all that fast. In fact the fastest lap it recorded was just under 10:58, which is a fairly average time for the Nordschliefe.

What we really want to know is why was it camo’d up last week when it was doing practice runs? My guess is that Team Gazoo just wanted to fuck around with all those poor spy photographers and bloggers. Bastards.

Full story and more pictures are over at Jalopnik.

[Source: Bridge To Gantry]
[Images and video courtesy of Bridge To Gantry, KGP Photography]