‘JUNIOR’ SUPERCAR CAN FLY
Most powerful V-8 engine in Ferrari’s history powers the impressive Pista
MARANELLO, ITALY Come to Italy, they said, and test a Ferrari on the racetrack. Escape all that horrible snow that’s blanketing the northeast. Bask in the warmth of a spring Mediterranean breeze.
What we got was snow — yes, snow — on a spring day in Italy that was colder than in Toronto. How cold, you ask? So cold, Ferrari’s public relations mavens told us, that the Pista — Ferrari’s fully “weaponized” version of the 488 GTB — would have to run on winter tires, the Michelin Sport Cups specifically designed for it being simply too stiff in these cold climes to serve as anything other than giant hockey pucks. So, yes, I ended up travelling all the way to Italy just to sample the magic of Ferrari’s latest supercar on the most famous test track in the world — on snow tires.
Snow tires or no, though, Ferrari’s new Pista is a mad thing. First off, there’s the claimed 720 horsepower. Oh, to be sure, they’re of the slightly wimpier “CV” European-breed equines, translating into about 710 North American Clydesdales, but that’s still 50 more horsepower than a garden variety 488. What one gets is a supercar that now tops out at more than 340 km/h (that’s 210+ miles per hour, folks), accelerates to 100 km/h in less than three seconds and hits the 200 km/h mark in under eight seconds.
That makes Ferrari’s supposedly ‘junior’ supercar virtually as fast as all those million-dollar hybrid ‘hypercars’ introduced but five years ago.
What really matters — at least for those lucky denizens of Bay Street fortunate to have half a mil to blow on a set of wheels — is that the Pista’s 7.6 seconds is barely 0.2 s slower to 200 km/h than Porsche’s million-dollar 918. Lamborghini’s Aventador LP 750-4 Super Veloce — with four more bellowing pistons — is barely 10 km/h faster on the top end than the baby Ferrari.
Even Maranello admits that its own, once-thought-indomitable electrified V-12 LaFerrari is less than two seconds faster around Fiorano than the new Pista. Equipped with similar tires and without all that aforementioned snow, of course.
And yet, as scintillating as that incredible turn of speed may be, it’s not the best thing about the new 488. No, what makes the Pista so special, what makes this one supercar stand out in a sea of similarly turbocharged competitors is that this particular twice-turboed 3.9 L feels like the good old naturally aspirated V-8 we thought we had lost with the passing of the 458.
As for exactly how good the Pista’s roadholding, cornering and steering will be, please see my first paragraphs about snow, cold and winter tires. Snow tires on a Ferrari, even Pirelli’s entirely creditable PZero Sottozeros, are a bit of the proverbial fish on a bicycle. What little I can say is that in its full attack mode, the Pista’s suspension is decidedly more firm than the base GTB’s and that Ferrari’s latest Side Slip Control system manages to contain all that power in conditions better suited to dog sleds and snowball fights.
What we can say is that if the 488 GTB felt a little tame in the way it charged about, breaking speed limits, Ferrari has now let the dogs out.
Indeed, the highest compliment I can pay the Pista is that it felt a lot like the much-missed 458. On steroids, of course.