First Drive: 2011 Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Spyder Performante
Track Attack in Sant'Agata's Surefooted Topless Sled
Helmet on. Eyes forward. Body shivering. With no solid roof over my head, every piercing degree of upstate New York chill torments my muscles. My fingers can barely grasp the snarling Italian mount's Alcantara-swathed wheel as we sit impatiently in Monticello Motor Club's pitlane.
Standing still is what the 562-horsepower Lamborghini Gallardo LP 570-4 Spyder Performante despises most. It is akin to hell for a beast whose sole purpose is pulverizing open stretches of asphalt. But if all goes as planned, man and machine will soon be in heaven.
A yell comes over the two-way Motorola radio lying in the carbon-fiber center console. "It is time!"
My feet, which thankfully have been out of the cold's reach, begin their two-pedal dance. My fingers loosen as I slap the right paddle and the adrenaline starts to flow. The bull begins to rage.
Unleashing a full throttle prodding, the Spyder Performante launches into an all-out I-hate-you-with-a-passion charge that has its cold Pirelli hooves screeching in a desperate struggle to stick to the slippery surface. When they finally adhere, the cold wind swirling inches from my carbon-fiber cocoon matters no more. My nearly useless appendages find life. The squawking walkie-talkie is in pieces somewhere behind my stiff bucket throne.
Once perturbed, the bull changes your very being. Sweat streams from every pore. Regular-fit jeans turn hipster skinny. Ears feast on the Performante's raw, metallic Italian baritone. Vision tunnels. You have to remember how to breathe. This is much more than a point-and-shoot sports car, say, in an almost-numb, Porsche Turbo S or Nissan GT-R type of way. In the open-top Gallardo, you're intimately involved with its every motion and emotion.
Claimed performance numbers corroborate the experience. A Euro-specified 62 mph arrives in a scant 3.9 seconds, meaning 60 mph should come in a tick or two earlier, putting it near the Murcielago LP670-4 SuperVeloce at 3.2 seconds, but well behind the new LP700-4 Aventador's high-2-second claims. The aforementioned Porsche and Nissan are much quicker at 2.8 and 2.9 seconds, respectively, but in terms of pure sexiness, the Spyder Performante has them easily trumped.
Monticello is one of the best places to play in a Performante without a police helicopter hovering overhead. Aside from the unseasonable sub-arctic April climate, the track offers ideal wet-spaghetti-like pavement with enough challenging curves and elevations changes to keep anybody happily entertained. Think of the tree-infested Nürburgring Norsdschleife without graffiti for a gist of what Monticello looks like in the springtime.
Trying to unsettle the Performante takes loads of effort to accomplish, which is good considering its $253,095 price tag. Tight corner after wide corner, rev-matched paddle pull into tight pants thrust mode, the slightest swivel of its helm translates into a precise tracing of the Earth's minute nuances. Wondering if Velcro had a hand in developing the car's model-specific rubber and all-wheel drive settings isn't as ridiculous as it sounds after feeling the G-loaded hijinks. Feedback from at wheel is near-telepathic. Cue the Na'vi-Toruk references now...
Redzone the engine repeatedly using the E-gear's six cogs, and with enough courage and asphalt, you'll hit the aerodynamically limited 201-mph top end. Today, there's not enough of the latter. But on the back straight in fourth gear, I'm touching 124 mph before calling on the 14-inch brakes just ahead of a first-gear, 12-mph hairpin. Mashing them only reverses the massive attack; under high negative g-loads, the bull remains composed thanks in part to the fixed wing out back.
