Blasting the Ferrari 488 Spider through Italy

There really is no such thing as a free lunch. With the global car industry still fumbling its way through the aftermath of the VW emissions debacle, Ferrari has reimagined its signature V8 to the tune of 661bhp, 561lb ft, while simultaneously slashing CO₂ and fuel consumption. Yet all anyone thinks to ask about is the noise, and how crisp the throttle response is now that the engine is t****charged. How do these guys catch a break?

They don’t. Because this is Ferrari we’re talking about, and therefore we have unfeasibly high expectations. Sorry about that, chaps. Give the 488 Spider’s spec a cursory inspection, and you’ll have a serious headache long before you’ve figured out how the algorithms governing the E-diff’s interaction with the traction control work, or quite how they can have improved the side-slip-angle thingy for extra slidey fun with impunity. Ferrari might still play on that old devil Enzo for a narrative kick, but right now, the technology story in Maranello could give the bum’s rush to Silicon Valley’s most Tefal-headed boffins.

Photography: Joe Windsor-Williams

This feature was originally published in the December 2015 issue of Top Gear magazine.

Sure, the 488 Spider still has an engine and four wheels, just like the very first car Enzo Ferrari put his name to, 1947’s 125 S, but in every other significant respect it might as well be an emissary from the fifth dimension. So what we’re here to explore isn’t the car’s performance or handling – we already know these are unimpeachable – but its soul.

This is less easily located than it used to be. For a start, Ferrari is very businesslike these days. It knows that it needs to keep the new product flowing fast. The flotation on the US stock market is under way (the IPO values Ferrari at approximately $10bn, which means the company is being scrutinised by merciless high-end financiers, and it needs to stake out the territory where luxury and technology intersect most lucratively. This has focused a fair few minds.

Then there’s the fact that new invariably equals good at this end of the market. Not to mention that the sales split between Spider and GTB is almost 50/50. In fact, in the UK 54 per cent of 458 Italias sold were convertibles. In other words, this car matters.

Ferrari claims that the 488 Spider was developed around its retractable hard top, a slender two-panel item that weighs 25kg less than a regular soft top, creates that extra sense of security and rigidity, hides away in 14 seconds and crucially doesn’t saddle the car with a backside the size of a small country. Ferrari’s marketing boss also insists that coupe and convertible clients are quite distinct, and there’s some puffery about being able to breathe in “nature’s heady aromas”.

Well, nature’s heady aromas will have to move fast to keep up with a committed 488 Spider driver – as with the GTB, 62mph is done in 3.0 seconds dead, 124mph in 8.7, and the top speed, should you be absorbing the especially fragrant smells of the German autobahn, is 203mph. Not the car for Donald Trump, then, or anyone else of risky or bouffant coiffure.

Ferraris used to be a bit flakey. Even the otherwise entirely magnificent F355 – the 1994 reboot of the shabby 348 and the car that got Maranello back on track – isn’t much to write home about inside. Its successor is an exquisite place to sit. The driving position is perfect, a low cowl helps the view ahead, and those gorgeously cresting front wings mean it’s easy to place on the road. I found the seats a little thin, but the main instruments and multimedia – sited in two wings either side of the main display, but with the rev counter to the fore – are now easier to use, as is the satnav. It all feels fabulously well made, too.

Ferrari road cars long ago surrendered simple beauty on the altar of aerodynamics, and the 488 Spider’s body is effectively an ode to this black art. Ferrari’s design director Flavio Manzoni is adamant that aero functionality isn’t the aesthetic impediment you might think. “If everything stays respectful of the technical principles, that’s better,” he says. “We would not feature bulges or scallops on the bonnet where they are not needed. So we have to understand what is beneath the skin.” Highlights on the 488 Spider include the central Aero Pillar at the front, a rear diffuser with variable flaps, and the same brilliantly elegant blown spoiler as on the GTB. The upshot is a load of downforce without drag. The downside is that the engine is no longer visible. Those gaping central air intakes also take some getting used to, but overall this is another modernist masterpiece from Maranello.

Time to go. We start in the hills several hours’ journey south of Ferrari centro, and plan to wind our way into nearby Rimini, a Miami-lite beach town on the Adriatic west coast heavy with the peculiar charm of the out-of-season holiday resort. Chief test driver, the charming and modest (given his best-job-in-the-world status) Raffaele de Simone, politely asks that we put the 458 Speciale out of our minds. We’ll try.

Anyone who’s been lucky enough to drive a 288 GTO or F40 will tell you turbochargers don’t necessarily stymie a Ferrari’s sound. Now that the dust has settled on the GTB, this particular pair of ears can report that the 488 Spider emits a noise somewhere in the same postcode as epic if not quite party central. It starts with a baritone rumble that swells to a noise similar in frequency to the one Brian Blessed must have made shortly after chewing through the umbilical cord of the baby he helped to deliver.

The technical reason for the Spider’s fruity sonics is a combination of equal-length tubing on the exhaust headers, its flat-plane crank, and some assiduous harmonic tinkering. But the fact is, nobody wants a Ferrari that doesn’t sound like a proper Ferrari. Including Ferrari. It’s definitively not as visceral as the 458 Italia, but by any objective measure it sounds pretty ruddy fabulous and frankly could peel the paint off the walls of any tunnel you choose to blast through.

Like the GTB, the Spider is a monumentally fast car, but accessing it is as much about exploiting its 561lb ft reservoir of torque as it is tapping up its 661bhp. Ferrari’s variable-torque geometry effectively mimics the delivery of a high-revving normally aspirated engine, dishing up progressively more grunt in higher gears, but while it simply vaporises the straight bits between the corners, it does so in a way that prompts some mental rejigging. To be honest, this is one of those cars that is capable of getting ahead of your brain – it’s that fast. But I don’t remember short-shifting through the gearbox quite as frequently in previous mid-engined V8 Fezzas (though the superb seven-speed dual-clutch set-up makes it a treat), and you no longer find yourself homing in on the red line like a loon. We’re talking Bryan Ferry rather than Blessed.

Meanwhile, the car’s E-diff, F1-trac and ESP work in blissful harmony, and the side-slip angle control system that debuted in the 458 Speciale gets a v2.0 upgrade. It takes the pulse of the car’s electronic chassis software – which now includes the active dampers – enabling it to blast out of corners with an almost comical mix of poise and flamboyance. Its magnetorheological damping system also gets a reboot, and the 488 Spider’s ride is sublimely good as a result, even with the same spring rates as the GTB (our car was on Michelins, but Pirellis or Bridgestones are also available – all bespoke for the 488, the difference between them undetectable to all but the experts).

Frankly, it’s difficult to think of another fast car that has such an expertly judged balance of handling and ride. McLaren’s 650S is arguably even cleverer and gets very close, but the 488 is friendlier on the limit. The latest-generation carbon-ceramic brakes are derived from the LaFerrari’s; they’re powerful enough to turn loose cabin objects into ballistic missiles, but lack feel on initial application. De Simone describes them as “almost living things… the system learns what you need and they develop more feel”. I almost believe him.

Rimini elicits various beeps and honks from passing Vespas, a few selfies are taken, and the car is mobbed on the quay. “Si, si, quattro otto otto, bella!” Italy should indeed be proud. Ferrari is a company at the top of its game, a master of both the invisible new software and the heart-pumping hardware. Purists won’t readily park the memory of the high-revving genius of the 458 Speciale, a car that will go down in history as one of the greats, maybe even the greatest normally aspirated V8 ever. The 488 has traded some of its soul in return for greater efficiency and even higher performance, but it’s hardly a Faustian pact. And just think of all the extra heady aromas you can inhale with the roof down.