Ferrari 488 GTB 2016 review

When the Prius with the letter L in front winds up to the stop sign, I start to think - out loud - about the feasibility of testing an Italian supercar in the middle of a big city.

It's like walking a cheetah on a leash or riding a Black Caviar.

Maranello's latest masterpiece, the Ferrari 488GTB, has just arrived in Australia and CarsGuide is the first to get the keys to it. We'd much rather drive straight onto a race track - preferably with kilometer-long straights and smooth high-speed turns - but don't look a gift horse in the mouth, especially a prancing horse.

In metal, the 488 is a truly beautiful beast, from the millimetric front end with its massive air intakes to the beefy thighs wrapped around the fat rear tires.

It's a more chiseled look than its predecessor, the 458, with hood creases and sharp edges on the classic Ferrari flowing sides.

Inside, the layout is familiar to Ferrari fans: red leather, carbon fiber accents, a red starter button, shift paddles, a toggle switch for driving settings, and even a row of red lights to warn of approaching speed. limit. The F1-style flat-bottom steering wheel wrapped in leather and carbon fiber makes you feel a bit like Sebastian Vettel.

The leather-embossed and stitched sports seats are snug, supportive and have to be manually adjusted - a surprise for a sports car worth around $470,000.

It's a crazy experience and if you're not careful, 488 will make you go a little crazy. 

It all looks and smells like the cockpit of a supercar should look like, although it's not a masterpiece of ergonomics. The push-button indicators instead of a regular switch are not intuitive, and the push-button reverse switch takes some getting used to.

The instrument panel still has a large, brassy, ​​central tachometer with a digital gear select display. It is now surrounded by two screens that house all the readings from the onboard computer, satellite navigation and infotainment system. It all works well and looks correspondingly prestigious.

But perhaps the most impressive eye decoration is reflected in the rearview mirror.

When you stop at a traffic light, you can look longingly through the glass cover at the magnificent turbocharged V8 mounted right behind you.

The power output of this new generation twin-turbo is astounding: 492 kW of power and 760 Nm of torque. Compare that to the 458kW/425Nm power output of the 540 and you get an idea of ​​the performance leap this car represents. But this is only part of the story - the maximum torque is now reached at exactly half the rpm, 3000 rpm instead of 6000 rpm.

This means that the engine doesn't so much start as it hits you in the back when you step on the gas pedal.

It also gave the Ferrari engine a bilingual character - at high revs it still makes the squeal of an Italian supercar, but now, thanks to the turbo, at low revs it sounds like one of those marble-screeching German sports sedans.

This means tunnels are your friends in the big city. The sound of that exhaust bouncing off the walls is satisfying, though you almost have to stick to first gear to keep from going over the speed limit.

You will accelerate to 100 km/h in 3.0 seconds, and if you keep the gas pedal to the floor, it will take you only 18.9 seconds to cover a kilometer from a standstill, at which point you are probably developing a speed of about 330 km/h.

This makes road testing a Ferrari in Australia a little problematic. The distributor's generosity wisely doesn't extend to the 488 fangs on the track, and the limit for our test is 400km, so blowing up on Top End roads with open speed limits is out of the question.

In an effort to avoid a huge fine and a career-limiting disqualification, we decided to see what thrills the 488 could deliver at legal speeds.

We are not disappointed. In a crazy three-second race to the speed limit, we are amazed at how the car moves off the line and changes gears at lightning speed. When corner one hits, we're marveled at the surgical precision of the steering and the saucer-like grip — it feels like your guts won't hold up in front of the 488's rear tires.

It's a crazy experience and if you're not careful, 488 will make you go a little crazy. At a speed of 100 km/h, he barely comes out of the canter, and you desperately want to know how he feels at a canter.

In the end, a return to the suburban crawl is a relief and a crushing disappointment. Traffic means there is no other choice but to sit back and soak up the smell of Italian leather, the admiring glances of other motorists, and a ride that is surprisingly comfortable for such a purposeful sports car.

A whirlwind romance, but I'd love to ask the question if I had the money.

Who makes the best turbo exotics? Ferrari, McLaren or Porsche? Tell us what you think in the comments section below. 

Click here for more pricing and spec information on the 2016 Ferrari 488 GTB.