What if Lincoln Made a Performance Sedan to Take On the Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing?
Lincoln has long been a symbol of success and elegance in America, but despite building its favourable reputation on large, pompous, and graceful luxury sedans and personal luxury coupes, the marque's contemporary lineup consists exclusively of crossovers and SUVs. Lincoln's last-ever traditional car, the Continental, was discontinued in 2020, and there has been no official announcement of another sedan from Lincoln since. Although it's certainly logical for Lincoln to pursue crossover and SUV buyers, which are undoubtedly the automotive industry's most lucrative segments at the moment, it's still incredibly important for brands to retain products within their portfolio that trace back to the company's roots, honouring brand legacy, and thus maintaining the original ethos of the brand that gets people excited to head down to their local showrooms. Mitsubishi, for example, is a brand that made this fatal mistake, and its sales figures and cultural relevance have suffered as a result. Contrast that with Lexus, which still cashes in on lucrative crossovers and SUVs, but keeps their brand relevant with exciting products that appeal to the inner children in all of us, such as the LC500 and the IS 350 F-Sport sedan.
An all-new, four-door sedan from the Ford Motor Company isn't out of the question, either. As our very own Amos Kwon recently reported, the marque's latest patent filings suggest that a four-door sedan variant of the iconic Ford Mustang could be on its way. As sales figures for the traditional Mustang coupe and convertible variants have slipped in recent years, many experts have cited the general public's shift towards more practical sports cars that combine sporting thrills with everyday practicality. A four-door sedan variant of the legendary Mustang pony car could fill that void in Ford's lineup perfectly, but going even further, its underpinnings could serve as a perfect base for a more luxurious, Lincoln-branded high-performance sedan.
Using generative text-to-image artificial intelligence and Adobe Photoshop, we take an imagined look at what a revived, true-to-its-roots Lincoln LS V8 could look like, incorporating current Lincoln design elements and styling cues, and imagining what currently existing powertrains it could optimize. These images are for speculation purposes only and in no way depict any actual Ford or Lincoln products.
In the early-2000s, Lincoln offered the LS in its showrooms–a mid-size, rear-wheel drive luxury sedan that shared its platform with the Jaguar S-Type and competed against the Cadillac Catera, the first-generation Cadillac CTS, the Lexus GS, and, albeit briefly, the Chrysler 300. Offered with the buyer's choice of a V6 or V8 engine, the Lincoln LS had almost a perfect 50/50 front-rear weight distribution, resulting in admirable driving dynamics and offered a capable blend of luxury and performance. Despite the popularity of Cadillac's CTS and Chrysler's 300, Lincoln never followed up the LS with a true replacement, and instead offered the Ford Fusion-based Lincoln MKZ, which gave up plenty of the sedan's performance appeal and targeted a lower-budget demographic–a questionable decision for a self-proclaimed "luxury" brand. As most of Lincoln's lineup followed suit, morphing its entire portfolio (other than the Navigator) into Ford-based, front-wheel drive sedans and crossovers, Lincoln's "luxury" appeal dwindled, and the marque has spent its more recent years attempting to turn things around.
Fast forward to 2025, and Lincoln's current portfolio reflects a truly impressive effort to reclaim the brand's former glory as a genuine luxury automotive brand. Despite consisting entirely of crossovers and SUVs, Lincoln's current lineup has come an incredibly long way in the past five years thanks to its talented design department, refined mechanical engineering, and innovative, up-to-date technology such as Lincoln's BlueCruise drive assist system. What better way to celebrate the brand's recent success and proudly plant the Lincoln flag in the contemporary automotive landscape than with an exciting, heart-pumping performance sedan that shares its underpinnings with a four-door Ford Mustang and has its sights aimed directly at the beloved Cadillac CT5-V, thus exclaiming the brand's competitive intentions to the world?
A rear-wheel drive, mid-size Lincoln sedan could provide an excellent blueprint for some serious performance, but it's also ripe for opportunities to integrate some of Ford and Lincoln's smooth and efficient EcoBoost powertrains as well. In its most basic form, the hypothetical, revived Lincoln LS could utilize Ford's 2.3-liter EcoBoost four-cylinder, which serves up a notable helping of 300 horsepower and 310 lb-ft of torque. Mated to a ten-speed automatic transmission and rear- or all-wheel drive, the basic variant of Lincoln's sedan would brilliantly blend comfort, efficiency, and performance, thus maintaining the original philosophy of the early-2000s Lincoln LS. If buyers are after even more power without sacrificing comfort and convenience, the 400-horsepower, twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter V6 found in the current Lincoln Aviator could serve as a fitting optional upgrade.
Using the Aviator's available powertrains also opens up the possibility of using the Aviator Grand Touring's plug-in hybrid tech, paired with the twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter V6, to make a combined total of 494 horsepower and 630 lb-ft of torque–combining seriously capable performance figures with smooth power output and admirable fuel efficiency. Going a step further, Lincoln could take on the widely-lauded Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing with a high-performance, V8-powered variant. Packing the supercharged, 5.2-liter V8 found under the hood of the previous-generation Ford Mustang Shelby GT500, the hypothetical Lincoln LS V8 revival could make up to 760 horsepower and 625 lb-ft of torque. Mated with a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission, or perhaps an optional six-speed manual since we're being ambitious, and sending power to the rear wheels, this variant could give the Cadillac Blackwing a serious run for its money and add some wild performance pedigree to Lincoln's contemporary portfolio.
View the 3 images of this gallery on the original article
Although this is just some wild day-dreamy hypothesis of a potential offshoot of Ford's not-yet-officially-confirmed four-door Mustang variant, we can't help but hope that if Ford is truly giving the idea of a rear-wheel drive performance sedan some serious thought, that maybe Lincoln will get a chance to utilize the platform for a model within their very own lineup, allowing the luxury marque to benefit from what would be their first rear-wheel drive based sedan since the Town Car, which hasn't been around since 2011, and even then it was essentially a forty-year-old vehicle. We love Lincoln here at Autoblog and think they've come a long way in their recent years, and we truly believe that their updated design language has made for some of the best-looking Lincoln models we've seen in a very long time. Such fantastic styling would translate incredibly well onto a sedan body, or perhaps even a coupe or cabriolet in an alternate universe where buyers still appreciated fun things, but for the time being we'll gladly settle for Lincoln's elegant current offerings.
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