If the chassis/body is more rigid, the car can carry more speed into the corners. In addition, a more rigid car is also more responsive to steering inputs.

But, a lighter car can accelerate faster out of the corners, carry more speed on the straights, and decelerate faster due to lower mass. However, all these advantages will be negated by the more powerful engine and the stronger Brembo brakes available on the Type-S.

So I'll say the Type-S will handle better than the 200lb light A-Spec SH-AWD. But by how much better, the only way to know is to compare their Nurburgring lap times.

 

ummm....do you know how many peformance cars add bracing over the 'base' model cars?!! WTH....

 

That's not really the issue. The issue is in how it was implemented. That extra brace detracts a lot to the already marginal practicality of the TLX-S. If you needed to haul a longer box that needed to pass through the rear seats, that will now require you to remove the bracing or use a different car. Cars like the G80 M3, which are far more rigid, are able to achieve this without encroaching on usable space.

Probably not the biggest deal in your day-to-day, but the few times you will need it, you'll sorely wish Acura had gone about it a different way.

 

I'm curious on this one too. I don't track my car. The hardest I corner is the occasional fast entry/exit from and on/off ramp so I would love to pull mine out to be able to haul the occasional larger items. My wife has the large SUV however so I just use that when needed so it wasn't a deal breaker for me.