Great article in LA Times

Thought you guys might enjoy this:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-neil12-2010feb12,0,2009541.column

Reporting from Maranello, Italy

Snow is a beautiful thing.

Snow wraps a pretty white scarf around the sordid and everyday. It's the stuff of Cascade watersheds, the frosting on Kilimanjaro, the secret ingredient in Telluride daiquiris.

Snow is to be cherished.

Yet it's not snowflakes that I see drifting into Ferrari's brick courtyard on the Via Abetone, the Temple Mount in this, the Jerusalem of Red Cars. Instead, I imagine I see tiny, confetti-like news clippings from Corriere della Sera, each one telling of an American journalist who managed to plunge a Ferrari 458 Italia into a snowy mountain suckhole. If I did that, it would be the biggest weather related-accident since Dallas Raines bought his wardrobe.

I kid you not, young lovers. As I turn the red enamel key in the ignition, and the V-8's devils begin to dance on the drumhead -- KeWhe-drummmmmmmm -- I am genuinely concerned.

Alas, the timing is what it is. I have a chance to drive Ferrari's newest mid-engine V-8 Berlinetta, a car that's quicker than the legendary Enzo (less than 3.4 seconds to 60 mph), with 72 horsepower more than the mind-frying F430, with a top speed in excess of 202 mph. A car with a wicked, scything aerodynamic shape, a bloody knife like never haunted Lady Macbeth.

And so the table is set: pounding snow, icy roads and a 562-hp, mid-engine reptile on stone-cold tires. An Italian hurt locker.

And yet, surprise, the 458 Italia rocks winter. Here's why.

* Sheer aesthetics: The sight of this slinky scarlet sports car against a white background is stunning, eidetic, heart-clutching and unforgettable. These are the colors of Richard the Lionhearted and footprints at Valley Forge. Epic is not too strong a word.

The technology governing the car's driving dynamics is astounding. With the 458 Italia, Ferrari has further integrated the control logic of its electronic differential, the E-Diff, with the world's smartest and most supple traction control, which Ferrari calls F1-Trac.

I won't saddle you with the specifics here, but it allows drivers to put down the power harder and earlier coming out of a corner. According to Ferrari, out-of-corner acceleration is up 32% over previous models. And that's grand on a warm, dry asphalt track like Ferrari's Fiorano facility (1.9 miles), where the 458 Italia laps as fast (1:25.00) as the Enzo.

And yet, for me, the tears-of-joy moment comes on a snowy country lane, when I nip into a slick hairpin. The stability system chatters a bit, the world pivots. As I unwind the wheel and open the throttle, the car scavenges every single thousandths of a percent of available grip under the wheels, converting it to chest-pinning thrust.

My God, the sure-footedness, the road holding, the easy progressive rotation of the car near the limit, the articulation of torque. On 20-inch, 35-series tires in the snow? OK, that's just eerie. As I wheel the Ferrari through the pig country of Emilia Romagna, I have several elucidating moments when I realize that,

in other exotics, I would probably be spatchcocked and smoldering around a tree.

I'm starting to fall in love.

* Steering: With a ratio that's two turns lock-to-lock, the 458's steering -- beautifully weighted, light and direct and glass-transparent -- is also freaky quick. When the car steps out, as it does when I punch the throttle in third gear on the Autostrada at about 120 mph, it's the merest flick of the wheel to correct. This thing dispenses more forgiveness than the Diocese of Las Vegas.

Also, with the 458 Italia, Ferrari has relocated the turn indicator switches, the wiper and headlamp controls to the steering wheel. These controls are, in a word, brilliant, completely intuitive and ergonomic and so much better than conventional stalks on the column I'm surprised no one thought of it sooner.

* Brakes: 15-inch carbon-ceramic front binders are standard on the 458 Italia, abetted by Ferrari's prefill braking system (the millisecond the driver lifts off the throttle, the brake system is hydraulically precharged to improve brake response). The 458 decelerates from 62 mph to a dead stop in a little over 30 yards. These brakes would stop a charging mastodon.

* Aerodynamics: The unholy look of the Ferrari -- the broad and low, angry shape, a straining singularity trapped in a red silk stocking -- is actually a very precisely engineered mechanism for moving air. In front, the two grille openings provide cooling for engine radiators; but at higher speeds, the radiators don't need as much airflow and so Ferrari (and styling house Pininfarina) created aero-elastic winglets that bend at speed to create more downforce.

Also, at the leading edges of the front fenders are thin evacuators that, as they vent air from the lower intakes, disrupt laminar airflow on the car's nose, again reducing lift.

Under ordinary circumstances, these writhing currents of air around the car would be invisible. But the falling snow acts like smoke in a wind tunnel, allowing me to see the aero in action. As I pound the gears and peg the rev limiter on the Autostrada (150, 160, 170 mph . . .), I look ahead to see a kind of snowy diverging shock wave. In the rearview mirror I see a swirling vortex tumbling behind, an aching hole in the air where a Ferrari used to be.

Welcome to Santa's wind tunnel.

* The sound: There are many fascinating things about this engine, a 4.5-liter, flat-crank, dry-sump V-8 outputting a delirious 562 horsepower and soaring to 9,000 rpm. It boasts the highest specific horsepower and torque of any naturally aspirated production engine (125 horsepower and 113 pound-feet per liter). It's running at a 12:5:1 compression ratio. It appears to be made by the same people who made God's wristwatch.

But it's the sound -- comprehensive, overwhelming, soul-shattering -- that I cannot believe, as it folds back on me against the velvety muteness of the falling snow.

For all its revs, the 458's sound pitch is not a shriek, but a lycanthropic howl, a baying, hungry on the moors. It's a sound that would make the supernatural "Twilight" teenagers soil themselves.

With the launch-control system engaged, the 458 can accelerate from a standstill to 124 mph in 10.4 seconds, quicker than I can read this sentence out loud. The effect on the human body is like biting into your neighborhood electrical substation.

But you'd expect the latest Ferrari hypercar to be fast, wouldn't you?

What you wouldn't expect is the car's overall timbre of frictionless sophistication and refinement, its startling atman of post-machine automobility. This thing is at least as much computer as car. The departed Enzo Ferrari would get in the 458, take it for a lap, get out and keel over dead all over again from the shock.

Perfect? Committed sensualists will miss some degree of adventure, if not lurking danger, the car is so benign and effortless. Gone are the adrenaline chinchillas running up and down your spine. The 458 Italia is spooky fast without the haunting of mortality. Insurance adjusters will feel differently.

Me? I've almost never been as happy as when I returned the perfectly unwrinkled 458 Italia to Ferrari.

I say, let it snow.
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