Sound the alarm and turn up your speakers – Ferrari has a security breach. Someone managed to get a good vantage point with a video camera over the company's private Fiorano test track in Maranello and caught the oft-photographed test mule of the upcoming new Ferrari model lapping the track at full throttle.
Known internally as project F149 and alternatively referred to externally as the Dino or GT California, the new model is expected to feature four seats and a retractable hard top. Although rumor has it that Maserati may be delegated the assembly (including the 4.7-liter V8 it makes for the GranTurismo S and Alfa 8C), this beast sounds every bit like a purebred stallion. Follow the jump to see for yourself.
Dutch designer Michiel van den Brink doesn't seem to be deterred by adversity. First he set out to pen a modern interpretation of one of the most iconic homologated racing GTs of all time, the 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO. Then he actually decided to build his design, basing it on the Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano, arguably the most dynamically sublime supercar ever to grace tarmac. When the Fiorano's 600-hp Enzo sourced V12 wasn't good enough, he teamed up with tuning house Edo Competition to turn it up to 11 by boring it out to 6.3 liters. The result? 750 horsepower. When Maranello declined to grant him its blessing, he started taking orders anyway from customers seemingly undeterred by the $1.3 million asking price... over the cost of the donor car.
Now that conjecture has begun circulating cyberspace that Ferrari is considering building a small run of convertibles based on the Fiorano, van den Brink has thrown his hat into the ring by unveiling his own design, dubbed the "GT Convertible". A far more convincing and seducing design than the photochops we've seen so far, van den Brink says he'll build it complete with a folding carbon-fiber hard-top for any interested customer.
That's some unfettered ambition, considering we've yet to see an actual copy of the Vandenbrink GTO built, yet despite an undisclosed but undoubtedly high cost for the sublime chop-job, Michiel might start taking orders before you know it.
More details are included in the press release after the jump, where van den Brink alludes to future designs to be based on the Audi R8, Spyker C8 Spyder and Corvette Z06. Oh yes, the future bears promise.
If you love insanely fast and gorgeous cars and you happen to be in Northern Italy over the next few weeks, you might want to swing by the Galleria Ferrari. The Galleria is in Maranello, not far from the factory where cars bearing the prancing horse are made. To celebrate their most successful year yet in terms of visitors, the Galleria is offering up a scarlet ticket to one lucky visitor and a guest. The person who buys ticket number 200,000 this year will get to spend the day at the factory and have lunch at the Ristorante Cavallino where old Enzo used to have his midday repasts. To top it all off, they then get to take a few hot laps of the Fiorano test track with one of the factory test drivers. The Galleria is open to Ferraristi daily (except for Christmas and New Years) from 9:30-6:00.
Ferrari's getting in on the environmental game. Well, relatively speaking. The next supercar from the home of the prancing horse will be lighter and use a lower-displacement engine, but still have at least 500 HP. Thoughts are that such a car would derive its powerplant from the one mooted for the Millechili concept shown earlier this year. Though the car shown was nothing more than cardboard, the powerplant spoken of was a twin-turbocharged, direct-injection, 550-hp, 3.0-liter V-8.
The other big news is more information on Ferrari's No-It's-Not-A-Dino. Instead, what will be revealed early next year is a 2+2 V8 with a 4.3L V8 mounted up front. Other changes to the rest of Ferrari's line have taken a back seat due to the marque's growing popularity. The 599 hardtop convertible has been put on hold in light of the coupe's 18-month waiting list. The 612 will remain unchanged until its replaced in 2010.
Evidently Ferrari decided that it couldn't wait to to unveil a track-bred sports car like the F430 Scuderia on a static auto show stage in Frankfurt. Instead Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo was accompanied by F1 drivers Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen as they pulled the tarp of the lighter, more powerful F430 in a private gathering (read: no press) at the company's Fiorano test track. Massa then slipped behind the wheel and pulled the car out the garage for some hot laps. This car's noise is the type of thing that makes grown men lose control of their bladders. A lucky attendee with a camera has posted the video, which is mostly in Italian with some English sprinkled in. But when you're talking Ferrari, who needs words? Just let the car do the talking!
The official media unveiling will indeed take place next week in Frankfurt. We'll be there.
Every so often, we come across something during our daily slog to and from work that merits a quick post, whether it be an aerodynamically-incorrect F-body, a not-available-in-North-America-but-here-anyway import, or something that's just plain cool. Today, it was the latter. Even when stuck in traffic like the rest of us, the Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano looks like it's moving faster than everyone else. And it sounds just as good. Yep, the ride home this evening got a whole lot more tolerable when this bad boy appeared in front of us. You just don't see too many of 'em day-to-day, y'know?
To commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Prancing Horse, VOD Cars has put together a compilation video that's a must watch for Fezza fetishists. Justifiably, there have been plenty of complaints about certain automotive vids whose producers are predisposed to bad music choices, masking the real aural wonders that are purportedly the focus of the flick. This isn't one of them, so click on through to enjoy.
When the engine on Massa's or Raikonnen's Ferrari monoposto overheats and catches fire, that's one thing. When the engine on a customer's personal Ferrari GT car goes up in flames, it's an entirely different story, distinguished primarily by the lack of emergency fire marshals and pit crew to handle it when it happens out on the open road.
Pictures are floating around the internet, much to be presumed embarrassment of Ferrari, of a brand-spankin' new 599 GTB Fiorano following a "spontaneous" fire emanated from under the hood. The car was taking part in the Ferrari 60 Relay event passing through the Galician city of Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
Earliest reports indicate that, feeling left out as all those Enzos and 360s were totaled, the 599 lit itself on fire on a bet. Someone ought to have a talk with the other little Ferraris about the dangers of peer pressure.
There could hardly be two more different approaches to the exotic supercar than the Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano and the Porsche Carrera GT. One's a production Italian gran tourismo with a front-mounted V12, and the other's a rare German targa with a mid-mounted V10. The Ferrari was designed and executed to be easy to drive, while the Porsche is reportedly twitchier than a monkey drinking coffee. As far as exotic sportscars go, they're like apples and oranges.
The question is, which one is faster? The video after the jump has your answer. The two supercars make two runs from a rolling start. One pulls ahead but by the end of the drag strip the second is ahead by a couple car-lengths. Follow the jump to find out which took the checkered flag.
(If you're thinking the Enzo would be a more fitting adversary for the Carrera GT, you're not the only one.)
Haman the Wicked was an ancient Assyrian viceroy who thought himself better than the King. He had an unquenchable thirst for power and fathered equally wicked sons. History, it seems, has come full circle, and there's a lot in a name. Today it belongs to the German tuning house Hamann that, in its unquenchable thirst for power, aims to better Ferraris – kings of all sportscardom – and as a result produces some seriously wicked offspring of its own.
The latest is a complete tuning package for the Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano, already hailed as one of the best GTs of all time. Hamann has tweaked an extra 53 horsepower out of the Fiorano's Enzo-derived engine, bringing peak power up to 673 hp, by fitting its own custom header. And in case the wail of the Fiorano's V12 just wasn't cutting it, Hamann also fitted its own exhaust.
Follow the jump to continue reading and for the full press release, or click here for more pics.
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