Popping my supercar cherry in a Ferrari Enzo
Labels:
ferrari,
super cars
No messing around in the is-it-isn’t-it-a-supercar middle ground for me. When it came to popping my supercar cherry, I went straight for the Ferrari Enzo. You can’t argue with an Enzo. It’s rear-wheel drive, there are 12-cylinders mounted behind the driver, it’s from Maranello, it’s mega rare and hugely expensive. It is definitely a supercar.
Think about driving an Enzo and you’ll get pretty excited. Get into one for the first time and you’ll probably be filled with dread. It just looks so foreign. There’s no gear lever, just paddles on the steering column. Reverse? A button on the steering wheel. And the theatre of lowering yourself into that brutally functional race-car interior, strapping yourself in and lowering the door feels more Top Gun than Top Trumps.
Pull down the butterfly door. Press the button to crank the engine. Twelve cylinders explode to a busy BAAAAAAAW. Please car, don’t hurt me. Pull up at an acute junction and you’ll see nothing out of the offside window. Reversing? I’ve seen more looking into a post box wearing shades. Then there’s that long, low front end that threatens to ground out on cat’s eyes. You have to really plan ahead when you drive an Enzo.
Truth be told, I didn’t get the Enzo out of third gear, so terrified was I of damaging it. But then again, third does equate to well north of 100mph!
The V8 Ferrari Scuderia might have since lapped Ferrari’s Fiorano test track quicker, but there’s still no touching the Enzo if you want the supercar experience as pure as it comes.
Think about driving an Enzo and you’ll get pretty excited. Get into one for the first time and you’ll probably be filled with dread. It just looks so foreign. There’s no gear lever, just paddles on the steering column. Reverse? A button on the steering wheel. And the theatre of lowering yourself into that brutally functional race-car interior, strapping yourself in and lowering the door feels more Top Gun than Top Trumps.
Pull down the butterfly door. Press the button to crank the engine. Twelve cylinders explode to a busy BAAAAAAAW. Please car, don’t hurt me. Pull up at an acute junction and you’ll see nothing out of the offside window. Reversing? I’ve seen more looking into a post box wearing shades. Then there’s that long, low front end that threatens to ground out on cat’s eyes. You have to really plan ahead when you drive an Enzo.
Truth be told, I didn’t get the Enzo out of third gear, so terrified was I of damaging it. But then again, third does equate to well north of 100mph!
The V8 Ferrari Scuderia might have since lapped Ferrari’s Fiorano test track quicker, but there’s still no touching the Enzo if you want the supercar experience as pure as it comes.
Mazda 3 saloon (2009) first photos
Labels:
mazda3
Mazda is replacing its 3 family of hatchbacks and saloons and we'll see this US-market sedan at next month's Los Angeles motor show. It's a four-door for the notchback-obsessed Americans, but we'll see the five-door Euro-style Mazda 3 hatch a few weeks later at the 2008 Bologna motor show. The new Mazda 3 is believed to be based on the engineering skeleton of a Ford Focus, so expect a front-wheel drive layout and a wide spread of diesel and petrol engines. However, Mazda is promising to repeat the Weight Watchers programme of the 2 supermini to pick out unnecessary heft – to the benefit of economy and performance.The new Mazda 3: full details
Details remain scarce on the new 3. Only this clutch of artily styled photographs has been released so far, and no other specification has been announced. They give a flavour of the latest Mazda design direction, although this isn't the sole work of styling chief Laurens van den Acker, as work on the 3 project had already started when he was appointed. We'll have to wait a while longer to see the fruits of his 'Nagare' inspiration – which will lead to cars designed with reference to natural waves, winds and flowing shapes.
Mazda 3: the business story
The 3 is a crucial car for Mazda, making up a third of its entire sales. Since launch in 2003, the company has flogged 1.8 million in more than 100 markets. But it remains a bit-part player in the UK, where it sells just 13,000 a year.UK sales will start in spring 2009, with no more than two bodystyles expected: the saloon pictured and the five-door hatchback.
Crashing on the Lambo Reventon launch...
Labels:
lambo Reventon,
super cars
Fate has never had a clumsier moment than when it decided that I should be the first journalist in the world to drive the €1m Lamborghini Reventon. At the time it was the only finished example in existence and it had already been sold. So no pressure.
Scary enough for a skilled supercar pilot such as our own Chris Chilton, but there’s never a Chris Chilton around when you need one. In fact, there was only me. We didn’t have the heart to tell Lamborghini that we were sending someone to drive its priceless piece of sculpture who is less well equipped than a polar explorer wearing short trousers.
Still at least it was dry when I woke up on the appointed day in Bologna. At least I wouldn’t have the absurd task of placing 641bhp through the wheels onto a greasy track. I managed a croissant.
At the secret test track a ten-strong team of Lambo engineers wearing black uniforms unloaded the shimmering beast and began polishing it earnestly ready for its first-ever drive by a mortal. They did a fairly decent job of not looking worried when the mortal arrived, looking more like an American tourist than someone a bit handy.
'Are you familiar with ze track?' I was asked. I confirmed that I was not. 'Ok. We show you, yes?' Yes.
An Italian called Carlo, weighing approximately three times less than me then hopped into the driving seat of a handy Nissan 350Z and, with me holding the shotgun, executed three dreamily perfect laps, complete with commentary. I tried to concentrate. Then we swapped seats, while the black-swarm of Lambo blokes eased the Reventon across the apron to the start straight. My first lap in the Nissan was a bit scruffy and rather slow, but by the second I had plucked up enough courage to enter turn three stupidly fast, giving me the opportunity to demonstrate oversteer and understeer in a blurred succession before fishtailing onto the grass and setting off on a massive excursion which ended in a sickening crunch against a grass bank. It took me and Carlo almost five minutes to walk back to the edge of the track (we could have done with a car really) where the Reventon crew were standing in awed silence. In the rain.
'Right,' I said. 'Think I’m ready now.'
The Reventon takes 3.4 seconds to hit 62mph but it didn’t do so that day. It can manage 210mph, but not on my watch. With Carlo’s boss sitting beside me I completed four laps so rubbish that even Force India won’t want to know about it. And all in agonising silence, heavily laced with the sound of Carlo’s boss wincing, shadow braking and endlessly re-gripping the handle of the scissor door.
The 48 valves in the V12 engine still sounded life-changingly glorious though. And the extraordinary liquid crystal instruments made the experience fighter-pilot sexy. Crap though I was, I knew I would never forget the elation or the sense of sheer privilege.
I remembered to thank Carlo’s boss when I got out, as my mother taught me. His mother, to judge by his silence, didn’t teach the same stuff.
Scary enough for a skilled supercar pilot such as our own Chris Chilton, but there’s never a Chris Chilton around when you need one. In fact, there was only me. We didn’t have the heart to tell Lamborghini that we were sending someone to drive its priceless piece of sculpture who is less well equipped than a polar explorer wearing short trousers.
Still at least it was dry when I woke up on the appointed day in Bologna. At least I wouldn’t have the absurd task of placing 641bhp through the wheels onto a greasy track. I managed a croissant.
At the secret test track a ten-strong team of Lambo engineers wearing black uniforms unloaded the shimmering beast and began polishing it earnestly ready for its first-ever drive by a mortal. They did a fairly decent job of not looking worried when the mortal arrived, looking more like an American tourist than someone a bit handy.
'Are you familiar with ze track?' I was asked. I confirmed that I was not. 'Ok. We show you, yes?' Yes.
An Italian called Carlo, weighing approximately three times less than me then hopped into the driving seat of a handy Nissan 350Z and, with me holding the shotgun, executed three dreamily perfect laps, complete with commentary. I tried to concentrate. Then we swapped seats, while the black-swarm of Lambo blokes eased the Reventon across the apron to the start straight. My first lap in the Nissan was a bit scruffy and rather slow, but by the second I had plucked up enough courage to enter turn three stupidly fast, giving me the opportunity to demonstrate oversteer and understeer in a blurred succession before fishtailing onto the grass and setting off on a massive excursion which ended in a sickening crunch against a grass bank. It took me and Carlo almost five minutes to walk back to the edge of the track (we could have done with a car really) where the Reventon crew were standing in awed silence. In the rain.
'Right,' I said. 'Think I’m ready now.'
The Reventon takes 3.4 seconds to hit 62mph but it didn’t do so that day. It can manage 210mph, but not on my watch. With Carlo’s boss sitting beside me I completed four laps so rubbish that even Force India won’t want to know about it. And all in agonising silence, heavily laced with the sound of Carlo’s boss wincing, shadow braking and endlessly re-gripping the handle of the scissor door.
The 48 valves in the V12 engine still sounded life-changingly glorious though. And the extraordinary liquid crystal instruments made the experience fighter-pilot sexy. Crap though I was, I knew I would never forget the elation or the sense of sheer privilege.
I remembered to thank Carlo’s boss when I got out, as my mother taught me. His mother, to judge by his silence, didn’t teach the same stuff.
Will supercars survive
Labels:
super cars
With oil at $130 a barrel, petrol at £1.20 a litre, our roads traffic clogged, our police force ever more vigilant against ‘speeding’ and eco green taking over from Italian racing red as motoring’s colour of choice, whither the supercar?
Well fear not, anxious reader. The supercar will be just fine. We’ve been here before. The ‘oil’ crisis of the ‘70s – after which supercars got faster and better. The ‘threat’ to performance cars by ‘speed sapping’ catalytic converters and lead-free petrol – after which supercars got faster and better. Various economic shocks, the most recent in the early ‘90s – after which supercars got faster and better. Despite these ‘setbacks’, there have never been so many great fast cars, entertaining so many drivers, in so many countries, from so many fast-car makers.
Supercars: the ultimate plaything
Supercars, let us not forget, are not mere transport. They are playthings, like speedboats, fancy yachts and private planes. Ferrari will no more disappear than Riva or Learjet. The wealthy will keep buying and enjoying them, even if the cost of entry (and of use) escalates. They make an infinitesimal contribution to global CO2, so there is no rational reason to ban or restrict them.
But the supercar will change. And the pressures of eco-sensitive legislation and taxation will improve the supercar, not strangle it.
An era of change is ahead
Supercars will get lighter, to save petrol and reduce carbon. Their engines will become smaller. They will be lighter. The corollary may be lower top speeds – but so what? When did you last see a Ferrari at Vmax? More important, they will be even more accelerative and more nimble, both boosting driving pleasure. For too long the thoroughbreds of the road have been more like chunky draughthorses than fine-limbed Arab stallions in girth and weight: bloated top-end supercars weigh as much as luxury saloons. A new generation of more lissom machines beckon.
We’ll see hybrid and electric power, as well as increasingly sophisticated petrol engines. And why not? Electric engines can be marvellous devices, smoother and simpler than Heath Robinson-like internal combustion engines. No hoses or mufflers or anti-pollution plumbing or lubricating oil or noise or smell. We have always known this; the weak link has been the energy storage – the batteries. But there seems to be genuine progress now, as flagged by the Lotus-developed Tesla. I haven’t driven one but I hear good things.
So we will not only see evolutions of the current mighty meaty motors; we’ll see a genuine revolution too. We are entering a golden age in motoring and in supercars. Change will take place faster and more fundamentally than ever. Hold on: it will be an exciting and rewarding ride.
Well fear not, anxious reader. The supercar will be just fine. We’ve been here before. The ‘oil’ crisis of the ‘70s – after which supercars got faster and better. The ‘threat’ to performance cars by ‘speed sapping’ catalytic converters and lead-free petrol – after which supercars got faster and better. Various economic shocks, the most recent in the early ‘90s – after which supercars got faster and better. Despite these ‘setbacks’, there have never been so many great fast cars, entertaining so many drivers, in so many countries, from so many fast-car makers.
Supercars: the ultimate plaything
Supercars, let us not forget, are not mere transport. They are playthings, like speedboats, fancy yachts and private planes. Ferrari will no more disappear than Riva or Learjet. The wealthy will keep buying and enjoying them, even if the cost of entry (and of use) escalates. They make an infinitesimal contribution to global CO2, so there is no rational reason to ban or restrict them.
But the supercar will change. And the pressures of eco-sensitive legislation and taxation will improve the supercar, not strangle it.
An era of change is ahead
Supercars will get lighter, to save petrol and reduce carbon. Their engines will become smaller. They will be lighter. The corollary may be lower top speeds – but so what? When did you last see a Ferrari at Vmax? More important, they will be even more accelerative and more nimble, both boosting driving pleasure. For too long the thoroughbreds of the road have been more like chunky draughthorses than fine-limbed Arab stallions in girth and weight: bloated top-end supercars weigh as much as luxury saloons. A new generation of more lissom machines beckon.
We’ll see hybrid and electric power, as well as increasingly sophisticated petrol engines. And why not? Electric engines can be marvellous devices, smoother and simpler than Heath Robinson-like internal combustion engines. No hoses or mufflers or anti-pollution plumbing or lubricating oil or noise or smell. We have always known this; the weak link has been the energy storage – the batteries. But there seems to be genuine progress now, as flagged by the Lotus-developed Tesla. I haven’t driven one but I hear good things.
So we will not only see evolutions of the current mighty meaty motors; we’ll see a genuine revolution too. We are entering a golden age in motoring and in supercars. Change will take place faster and more fundamentally than ever. Hold on: it will be an exciting and rewarding ride.
Lamborghini Estoque: the interior photos
Labels:
lamborghini car
These are our first pictures inside the Lamborghini Estoque's cabin – and they show what drivers might expect in the cabin of a Lambo saloon in three years’ time if this Paris motor show concept gets the green light.
Swathed in cream leather, the Estoque’s interior is dominated by a huge transmission tunnel that divides the cockpit into four individual zones, each with its own bucket seat. There’s a razor-sharp, angular theme at work in the cabin: even the column stalks are hexagonal.
What’s going on with the Lamborghini Estoque’s steering wheel?
We’ve become used to flat-bottomed steering wheels but the base of the Estoque’s wheel is actually bent in towards the hub. A fighter plane-style display that looks similar to the limited edition Reventon's is visible through the spokes.
Notice the two pedals in the footwell too? That’s because when the Estoque makes it to production – as we expect it will – it will be fitted with Lamborghini’s first dual-clutch transmission.
Is the Lambo saloon a real four-seater?
Our picture looking into the rear compartment is just as revealing. It shows why Lamborghini gave the Estoque a massive 3m wheelbase. Rear legroom appears to be at least as good as that in a conventional luxury limo like Audi’s A8.
That’s a vital commodity for a car like the Estoque. Customers are just as likely to be driven in their four-door Lamborghini as drive, so the rear space needs to be sufficient to allow them to work and relax.
Swathed in cream leather, the Estoque’s interior is dominated by a huge transmission tunnel that divides the cockpit into four individual zones, each with its own bucket seat. There’s a razor-sharp, angular theme at work in the cabin: even the column stalks are hexagonal.
What’s going on with the Lamborghini Estoque’s steering wheel?
We’ve become used to flat-bottomed steering wheels but the base of the Estoque’s wheel is actually bent in towards the hub. A fighter plane-style display that looks similar to the limited edition Reventon's is visible through the spokes.
Notice the two pedals in the footwell too? That’s because when the Estoque makes it to production – as we expect it will – it will be fitted with Lamborghini’s first dual-clutch transmission.
Is the Lambo saloon a real four-seater?
Our picture looking into the rear compartment is just as revealing. It shows why Lamborghini gave the Estoque a massive 3m wheelbase. Rear legroom appears to be at least as good as that in a conventional luxury limo like Audi’s A8.
That’s a vital commodity for a car like the Estoque. Customers are just as likely to be driven in their four-door Lamborghini as drive, so the rear space needs to be sufficient to allow them to work and relax.
