Wallpapers: 1000km in the Ferrari 488 GTB

Where’s the most appropriate place to take a Ferrari 488 GTB?

That was the question which faced Paul Horrell, who had been tasked with driving Top Gear magazine’s 2015 ‘Supercar of the Year’ a couple of months back. After several hours poring over a map of Europe, two options had been drawn up. They were as follows:

Plan A – In light of the 488’s frightening power output – 661bhp, since you ask – a glorious, 1000km journey starting in the Italian hillside city of Potenza, culminating outside the Colosseum in Rome. Why Potenza? Because translated into English, it means ‘power’.

Plan B – In tribute to the GTB’s other impressive figure – 560lb ft of torque at 3,000rpm – a pleasant, if uninspiring jaunt up the A38 in Cornwall and Devon, stopping by in the seaside town of Torquay.

Unsurprisingly, Plan A got the green light. This is how the adventure unfolded.

Judging by the pictures above, it went rather well. Ferrari’s aim with the 488 was to build a turbo engine that feels and responds like a naturally aspirated one. How come? Well, it has a lot to do with rules on fuel consumption, although the opportunity to design an engine that was more powerful, lighter and physically smaller was doubtless a no-brainer from an engineering point of view.

As a result the 488 delivers more than 40 per cent more torque than its predecessor, the 458; a difference that Mr Horrell went on to describe as “exhilarating to the point of being frankly shocking.” High praise indeed.

Not only is it thrilling, the 488 is also remarkably compliant at low speed and – as if you needed telling – utterly magnificent to look at. If you’d like to look at it some more, feel free to expand the images at the top of the page and set one as your desktop background. You won’t regret it.