Teamspeed First Drive: Ferrari 458 Spider
#1
10-14-2011, 05:24 PM
Teamspeed First Drive: Ferrari 458 Spider 
First Drive: Ferrari 458 Spider
Possibly the most brilliant drop top to date from Maranello
By Peter Burgess - Teamspeed contributing editor
After 60 minutes I was hurting enough to pull over. My 458 Spider was fitted with the optional sports seats, hugging fiercely below the rib cage. This isn’t normally an issue. My 911 has something similar. What the Porsche lacks, however, is the chassis technology that twenty more years of development brings.
Which means the Ferrari gives double the cornering power and the g-forces were starting to have a real punch-in-the-kidneys effect. But this was a rather special road trip, from Reggio Emilia in northern Italy to La Spezia on the Ligurian coast.
150km over the Apennines, on roads so twisty that, for the first 50km, there was no chance of getting beyond third gear. And narrow too, two cars wide but only inches to spare with a car coming the other way.
There wasn’t much traffic though, and even fewer signs of officialdom. A typical Ferrari launch then, where maximum exposure in the right conditions is everything.
I pulled over for a break, convinced too that I needed to lower the steering wheel to ease another dull ache from a recent shoulder operation. Three 458s came past, the crackling exhaust echoing through the valleys for minutes after they’d disappeared from sight.
With a judicious amount of throttle, valves in the exhaust open and all hell breaks loose. It brings the locals into their gardens to watch you pass, the metallic wail of a fast approaching Ferrari clearly doing funny things to Italian men of a certain age.
It also brought out the local Polizia Municipale who, out of the loop when it comes to a Ferrari media launch, had the audacity to pull over those three cars that passed me simply for being too noisy!
What captivated everyone who drove the new Spider was the simple thrill it gives as soon as you get behind the wheel. Initially the noise seems over the top. That feeling soon evaporates once you start driving the Spider like it’s meant to be driven, the sound not unlike what you’d get from the in-car footage of Alonso driving his F1 Ferrari. Nothing, even the McLaren, comes this close.
Part of the fun is undoubtedly the extraordinarily fast paddle gearshifts. The 9,000rpm limit becomes rather superfluous, as you’ll want to cram gear changes in as quickly as possible to hear that crack-crack-crack from the exhaust as the gears shift.
Within the paddle and auto mode options there are more than a dozen scenarios that can be set with the Manettino knob on the steering wheel. There’s no right or wrong setting, just find one that suits your driving style most.
The 458’s suspension stiffens as you move the Manettino into its more advanced settings, but there’s a button on the steering wheel that overrides that with a softer setting. It’s good enough to be a viable option for all road use, with little trade off in handling, and attributes like these reflect Ferrari’s years of experience in developing mid-engine sports cars.
The major controls work in complete harmony, allowing you to simply get on with extracting the most from the dynamic package you’ve selected. On winding mountains roads peppered with second, third and fourth gear corners the Spider never puts a foot wrong. The steering is fast and accurate, wheels simply go where you point them and the ceramic brakes haul you back if you overcook it into a tightening corner.
Where this 458 transcends so many rivals is the ease with which the driver can get so much out of the car. Whatever the level of skill, there’s a setting that will help you feel like, if not Alonso, still something of a superstar.
The interior is hardly a thing of beauty. Arguably it’s even ugly, the bulging vents on either side of the instrument binnacle especially challenging. But it is bespoke and it does function well. The large rev counter has a TFT display on either side that can be swapped between various options, including the speedometer, satnav, radio and chassis settings.
There’s room for a set of golf clubs behind the front seats, so they say. More plausibly, the under-bonnet area has good space for squashy bags.
When the roof is lowered – just 14 seconds to drop the twin aluminium panels behind the seats – the glass rear window sets itself automatically to the optimum height to minimise buffeting. The open Spider is a relatively unruffled way to travel. Roof up and you could well be in the coupe. It’s that refined.
And it makes you question why you’d buy the 458 Italia coupe instead. The Spider misses out on the panoramic view of the engine though the glass cover, and won’t have quite the edge of the coupe on a track day. But otherwise it is the best of both worlds. The perfect supercar, in fact.
!!!
#5
10-14-2011, 05:45 PM
Much better then that last Italian you guys drove! I kid I kid! Great review guys, well executed. The 458 spider will be one of the best all around drop tops around with supercar performance to boot!
#8
10-14-2011, 11:50 PM
I'm not at all a ragtop, or targa top, guy. I always prefer coupes. The only open top Ferrari I've ever owned was a Dino 246 GTS. But I think if I get a 458, it will be a Spider. This car seems just perfect to me.
