The man you see pictured above is Bruce Rice, or in Lotus’ books, the first North American customer to receive the keys to the firm’s new mid-engined Evora sports coupe. Rice took delivery of the red-colored Evora earlier this week at John Eagle European’s Lotus of Austin dealership in Texas.

In the States, the 2+2 seater Evora is priced from $73,500. It features a Toyota-sourced 3.5-liter V6 producing 276 horsepower that drives the rear wheels through a six-speed manual transmission.

Tipping the scales at just over 3,000 pounds, the Evora goes from 0 to 60 mph (96km/h) in 4.9 seconds and on to a top speed of 162mph (260km/h) while delivering over 30 mpg on the highway.