The concept of supercars has changed so much over the years and it’s impossible to understand this evolution without taking a big leap into the past and we’ve tried. But before telling you about it, let’s go back for a moment precisely to the meaning of the word supercar, which today is linked only to issues such as performance, design and costs, while until a few decades ago a supercar was first of all a “difficult” car: difficult to have. , to see, but also to drive, even in basic maneuvers. Mind you, the prices of supercars were and remain exorbitant, out of reach of most, but information and knowledge are completely available in the digital mare magnum. Just one click and you can discover every secret of any supercar, even its driving to the limit. An overexposure that prevents myths from being created and nurtured as it happened until the 1990s, when generations of children dreamed on posters and memorized the few data and articles available.
So, getting on (but it would be better to say getting off) on the Lamborghini Countach is a leap to the heart. It is a “25 anniversary” of 1990, the last to leave the production line to immediately enter the museum of the Casa del Toro, as a witness to an era that will never return. This final edition has lost part of the purity of the design created by the genius of Marcello Gandini, in favor of the typical opulence of the Eighties, but the result does not change. When the door opens upwards forcing you to contort, you not only enter the passenger compartment but in a separate way. The driving position defined by the height just over one meter is completely lying down, with the arms outstretched and the steering wheel far away. The pedal set is small, narrow and completely offset to the right, so much so that the left foot struggles to find space.
But its troubles have only just begun, because the clutch is hard as a boulder and you can’t even slip too much so as not to damage its components. There is no power steering, there is no power brake and the gearbox requires decisive and precise actions. Last but not least, the throttle is hyper-responsive. In other words, getting out of the parking lot is down to a very complicated operation. Just to have a yardstick, doing the same thing with an Aventador, by comparison is child’s play, or rather, as a novice driver. Once on the road, then, you are enveloped by a series of mechanical sensations, sounds and vibrations now relegated to mere memories. The 455 bhp 5.2-liter V12 24V roars and chokes the carburetors, without having the speed in revving its descendant but with a lot of passion. An almost epic crescendo and one wonders how difficult it can be to take this car to the limit. Not that an Aventador is ever easy, but the distance feels really great. By the way, it is she, thirty years after the end of production of the Countach, who provided the technical basis for its rebirth.
The LPI 800-4 is not a nostalgia operation or an exercise in style, but a contemporary reinterpretation of the spirit of the Countach, not only of the original from 1971, but also of the LP 400 and LP 500, up to the Quattrovalvole di mezzo. the eighties. But it is certainly the first favorite of Mitja Borkert, Lamborghini Design Manager “Its design is made of perfect proportions, with a very pure and essential style that has a single longitudinal line as its distinctive trait. It is a perfect inspiration, the summa of the DNA of all our design “. To achieve it, the carbon fiber monocoque of the Aventador and the hybrid powertrain of the Sián, with its 814 hp that make the Countach of the new millennium fly at 355 km / h with an acceleration from 0 to 100 km / h in 2.8 seconds and from 0 to 200 km / h in 8.6 seconds. Numbers that a lucky few will have the privilege of experimenting, given that only 112 will be built, precisely in honor of the progenitor’s project code: LP 112 precisely.