FIRSTDRIVE FERRARI 458 SPIDER:'IT IS no problem. This is Ferrari," says a young guy in a Lancia. He's an official Ferrari minder, who has appeared from nowhere to deal with a pressing problem: yours truly is being arrested. Right now, an officer with a stylish-looking handgun is grasping my driving licence like he's discovered the Holy Grail.
It’s not even clear why I’m being held. He speaks no English and my Italian amounts to ciao and bella, bella. The most likely explanation concerns the outrageous acoustics of the Ferrari 458 Spider. I’ve just climbed a hill in second and third gear, letting the V8 scream to 9,000rpm. Parked at the top, our officer must have reached a simple conclusion: a Ferrari barking so loudly must have been travelling stratospherically fast.
Our minder grabs his mobile phone and calls a magic number. There’s a bit of banter in Italian before the officer meekly hands back my licence. “It is no problem, this is Ferrari.” We’re free and with seven hours left in the day.
The Spider is a topless version of the rather wonderful 458 Italia. Unlike its predecessor, the F430 Spider, the 458 doesn’t have a softop. Instead, Ferrari has engineered a hard-top that can twist, rise and fall in a theatrical 14 seconds. It’s a work of genius and ensures that the Spider is at least as beautiful as the coupé. Some might say even more so.
Ferrari reckons it’s identified key differences between the coupé and Spider buyer. Coupé boy is likely to head to the track and travel alone, while Spider man will head to the coast with an attractive lady friend. Philosophically, it’s been developed to sit between the coupé and the California cruiser.
The Spider is just 50kg heavier than the fixed head and retains its 4.5-litre V8, complete with 562bhp and 539Nm of torque. Ferrari claims an identical 0-60mph time of 3.4 seconds, but top speed falls to a “mere” 319km/h. It is, in other words, cartoonishly fast.
Tease the throttle and there’s a distinct “pop” from the exhaust as the pistons get to work. At the twitch of a toe you can switch between a baritone roar and a full bore howl. So rapid is the response that you can oscillate between the two in an instant. At 5am on a Dublin backstreet it would be obnoxious, but out here in the Italian hills it’s nothing less than sensational, and made all the more immediate by the absence of a roof.
Chopping off the lid has brought some compromises though. The Spider is thirty per cent less stiff than the coupé and on low speed, poorly surfaced roads, you can feel it. Even with the dampers in the comically named “bumpy road” setting, there’s still enough flex in the body to send a tremor through the wheel. Pick up speed, though, and the frequency of the body movements is more in tune with the dampers. Now it all makes sense.
In other cars, the rabid steering response would be unsettling, but not the 458. It turns on its nose in an instant. Suddenly the whole car feels so much smaller, darting from corner to corner with a twitch of your wrists and a flick of the paddle-shift box. It’s so composed and capable and yet brilliantly entertaining.
Like the coupé, the Spider has a “manettino” that allows you to choose different settings for the engine, gearbox, traction control systems and the electronic differential. It’s the key to the car’s split personality.
Raise the roof, select “Wet” and the Ferrari is happy to pose as a comfortable commuter. The ride is excellent for such a focussed car and the absence of wind noise at high speed is hugely impressive. On these mountain roads, though, it makes most sense to leave the manettino in “Race”. This optimises the gearbox and engine for performance, but retains the safety net of electronic help if you run out of talent.
There are some wonderful details. With the roof up, for example, you can lower the glass rear window and let the V8 symphony fill the cabin. But there are also some Italianate eccentricities. If you’re using the sat nav, the speedometer is much too small; it’s easier to open the engine cover than the (surprisingly spacious) boot and the button to open the glovebox is hidden on the centre console where you’d expect to find a handbrake.
It’s also expensive, of course. With no Ferrari dealer in Ireland, and none likely in the current recession, you’ll have to head to the North or over to Britain for your new prancing horse. There, the sterling base price of £198,856 is £25,675 more than the coupé and most will find the grand total after optional extras will hit £250,000. Add in the tax due when you add a new 12-registration plate to the car in Ireland and change from €500,000 will be the type that rattles around in your pocket.
That’s huge money for a V8 Ferrari but it’s unlikely to shorten the waiting lists internationally, even if Irish buyers will not feature on them anytime soon. Ferrari reckons they’ll build 1,500-2,000 Spiders each year, equivalent to half the 458’s global sales.
If you’re a (wealthy) track day fan, the coupé remains the purer driving experience, but the Spider has its own appeal. Driving top down with the V8 singing at 9,000rpm is one of life’s seminal experiences. Unless, that is, you find the local Polizia at the top of the hill.
Factfile
Engine4499cc V8 putting out 562bhp at 9,000rpm and 540Nm of torque at 6,000rpm
Gearbox7-speed twin clutch automated manual
0-100 km/h3.4 sec
Top speed319km/h (198mph)
L/100km (mpg)9.8 (23.9)
Emissions(motor tax)
275g/km(€2,100)
Price£198,856 in UK