2015 Ferrari 458 Speciale Review
What's Hot: Spine-tingling sound, visceral steering, sublime drivetrain, immersive drive experience, just about everything.
What's Not: Can struggle to get power down cleanly.
X-FACTOR: Arguably the greatest driver's car ever made.
Vehicle Style: Two door sports car
Price: $550,000 (plus on-roads)
Engine/trans: 445kW/540Nm 4.5-litre petrol 8cyl | 7sp dual-clutch
Fuel Economy claimed: 11.8 l/100km
Photography: Jan Glovac and Karl Peskett.
OVERVIEW
Obvious statement warning: The Ferrari 458 Italia is a brilliant car.
It manages to combine supercar performance with everyday usability and offers a drive experience second to none. Well, it used to.
The “second to none” has now become “second to one” - the 458 Speciale.
The Speciale continues in the vein of its predecessors, the F355 Serie Fiorano, the F360 Challenge Stradale and the 430 Scuderia.
All were performance versions of their donor cars, and all were designed with the track in mind.
It's been lightened and fettled to produce more power, and to be faster, even debuting a mode called 'side slip control' (SSC), enabling perfect drifts around corners.
It's not hard to see why expectations were high before we were handed the keys.
Forms were signed, hands were shook and we set out for the greatest few days of driving available in this country in a road legal car.
THE INTERIOR | RATING: 4/5
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