I have been curious about hybrid cars for as long as they’ve been around but I had never driven one so a recent invitation from Lexus to test drive their 2011 CT 200h seemed the perfect opportunity to put this right.
Their invitation arrived via Twitter which I use to keep in touch with members of FOXY Lady Drivers Club and to help spread FOXY Choice’s female friendly message within the UK motor industry. Lexus had evidently spotted this and tweeted us about their #socialtestdrive service because they wanted as many women drivers to know about this as possible. And how better to test this on behalf of foxy lady drivers everywhere, than to take one of their Social Test Drives myself, which is exactly what I did and why I am now recommending this service to others!
If I’m honest, I didn’t know too much about Lexus either, other than it being a luxury car brand and one that always seemed to appear at the top of customer satisfaction surveys; a long way ahead of the everyday car brand names I was more familiar with. I had unwittingly assumed that this meant that their cars would be very expensive but the list price of the Lexus CT200h hybrid I test drove is just £22,740. When you factor in the savings this means in terms of fuel economy and not having to pay any road tax or London congestion charge this starts to make it a very attractive proposition indeed.
Test driving a new car
I know from our Club research that many women drivers are nervous about taking a test drive at dealerships and perhaps my feelings are typical of some of theirs.
Whereas my husband seems able to jump in any car and drive it to its limits, I don’t have that kind of instant confidence. I need time to get the feel of any new car before I drive it, spending time adjusting the driving seat and mirrors to my total satisfaction. If I’m to test drive this alone I’ll even flick through the vehicle handbook first (looking for a section titled ‘Important information when test driving this car’ in vain…) just in case. And when I do set out, I’ll always start slowly to familiarise myself with the width and length of the car, its clutch, acceleration and braking style before I can truly relax.
So the thought of taking a test drive with what might be a smug and patronising male salesman (sorry guys but this is in many female minds…) who expects me to just get in and drive, can be daunting. Which may well be why many women take a man with them of course; so the guys can swap technical banter and not bother the driver 
.
Fortunately Lexus seems to understand all this and is keen to make the car shopping experience as enjoyable as possible for us. I imagine that their test drive arrangements vary across the UK (they’ll tell you this if you tweet #socialtestdrives) but if you head into a Lexus car dealership first you are likely to meet a ‘host’ who’ll do as much or as little for you as you want. If you prefer to browse on your own that’s fine but if you want to know more, your ‘host’ will then involve a sales person. And if you decide to take a test drive you can always ask for a female member of staff to accompany you, wherever this is possible.
So the prospect of test driving the Lexus CT 200h 1.8 SE-I 5dr CVT Auto Hatchback at a time to suit me, from my home base as it turned out, was the perfect scenario. I was able to drive it on rural roads in Sussex before heading into central London to attend Radio 2′s Pop Festival in Hyde Park. The fact I was able to do this almost straightaway, on a combination of wet and dry roads as well, tells you just how easy I found this car to drive.
First impressions
I’m sure you’ve seen the Lexus CT 200h in the adverts fronted by Kylie Minogue. The CT means Compact Tourer by the way and it’s a 1.8 hybrid engine which was launched in the UK in January 2011. It looked just as stylish sitting on my drive and as good luck would have it, if I had been asked to specify a colour, I’d have gone for the Cerulean Blue metallic paint I was looking at, with its stylish black leather seats, spacious interior, reassuringly big wing mirrors and impressively roomy boot.
I was able to take my time, to feel comfortable in the driving seat and to appreciate that the ‘engine’ is really the battery when you first turn it on; so it’s virtually silent. The dashboard lights come on so you know something is happening but you don’t hear the customary vroom which is odd to begin with.
It’s also a semi automatic which I liked; you floor the brake pedal before selecting Drive or Reverse and as soon as you lift your foot the car glides into motion. That’s very smooth but please don’t think it’s a slow mover by any means; it can accelerate from 0 to 62 in 10.3 seconds if you need it to.
As it happened, my husband wasn’t able to come with me that day so I took my 6ft tall 18 year old son instead. This meant I had a self declared expert with me to test out all the onboard gadgets. This required a thorough ‘play’ with them all first of course, after which I got the thumbs up for the music system, the Bluetooth gizmos, SatNav and a very helpful visual reversing screen. It was good to be able to concentrate on the drive of course but I’m confident that even I could have coped with the central menu screen with its radio, music, satnav and cabin heating controls…
Helped by the foolproof SatNav system we travelled smoothly through Croydon and South London suburbs, up a busy Park Lane and into a Marble Arch car park with the minimum of stress. Quickly enough for us to fit in an excellent Sunday lunch at the Cumberland Hotel’s (Gary) Rhodes Brasserie before strolling across the road and into Hyde Park in plenty of time to catch the opening act of the afternoon – Jools Holland.
In more detail
In simple terms (for me that is) the hybrid engine and the battery take it in turns to drive the car as and when this makes best and most economic driving sense. You’d be wrong to imagine that this makes it a sluggish performer though; we really enjoyed the Sport driving mode for a firmer and more zipply drive through the country lanes on our journey home. You don’t have to do anything to recharge the battery of course, it tops itself up from the engine so you don’t need to worry about recharging points – one of the downsides of electric cars as things stand.
This hybrid relationship makes for an impressive 68.9mpg for a combination of urban and rural road driving conditions, like our journey to and from Hyde Park. Band A emissions of 94g/km means that no VED road tax is payable or the London congestion charge which is a big bonus. And of course you get the three year Lexus warranty, knowing their dealers have a reputation other manufacturers covet when it comes to customer service!
All in all, the basic price for the Lexus CT 200h SE-1 is £18,950 plus VAT bringing it to a very reasonable list price of £22,740 with a 10% Benefits in Kind (BIK) tax rating for business users. You can then add optional features to suit, like parking assist sensors, metallic paint colours and various packages to include cruise control, a back guide reversing monitor and other navigation aids.
Overall I was very impressed and see this as a hard bargain to beat. It’s an impressive package and I’m confident that the Lexus CT 200h will soon become a very foxy car for stylish women drivers who realise that they can get this sort of value for money, the next time they are shopping for a new car.
To take a Lexus Social Test Drive in your area
If you’d like to test drive a Lexus just tweet your requirements to #socialtestdrive. Lexus tells me that they’ll then do all they can to come up with an experience to give you time to bond with their car. This can be an accompanied drive or not. Ordinarily this could take as little as 2 hours to as much as a whole day to suit you.
You can request any model (including the CT200h) and depending on the location they’ll do their best to make sure you get to drive the model of your choice.
So if you’re as curious as I was, why not have a test drive and see for yourself?
FOXY Steph
