2020 Ferrari F8 Spider
BASE PRICE $302,500LAYOUT Mid-engine, RW2-door convertibleD, 2-pass,ENGINE 3.9L/710-hp/568-lb-ft
twin-turbo DOHC
32-valve V-8
TRANSMISSION 7-speed twin-clutch auto
CURB WEIGHT (F/R DIST%) 3,600 lbs (MT est)
WHEELBASE 104.3 in
L X W X H 181.5 x 77.9 x 47.5
0-60 MPH 2.7 sec (MT est)
EPA FUEL ECON 15/19/16 mpg (est)
RECOMMENDED FUEL Premium
ENERGY CONSUMPTION,
CITY/HWY225/177 kW-hr/
100 miles (est)
CO2 EMISSIONS, COMB 1.17 lb/mile (est)
ON SALE Currentlybrakes that lacked bite, to put it mildly.
“Stand on them like you’re trying
to break the pedal off,” I said in my
review at the time. By contrast, the
F8’s brake feel is substantially better
than the 488’s. It’s not perfect. You
need to take a cue from that prancing
horse eyeballing you from the center
of the steering wheel and put your
hoof in it. Ferrari still needs to buy a
911 Turbo S and reverse-engineer its
braking system; in the meantime, this
evolution makes the car so much more
enjoyable to drive fast.
How much you’ll enjoy driving
fast will entirely depend on how you
position the manettino control knob
on the steering wheel. Sport mode will
save you from yourself with enough
of a knuckle slap to let you know you
messed up. Race mode dons a cloak
of invisibility, hiding its corrections
and adjustments so shrewdly you’d
swear it wasn’t doing anything. You
really believe the car is that poised, has
that much grip, that you’re that good
of a driver and everything is falling
perfectly in place. Purists will balk, but
when the lies are this good, I say lie to
me. They are grand lies indeed, as you’ll
find out if you switch it to CT Off
or ESC Off. Turn the wheel and goose the throttle, and you’ll see what
happens when you play fast and loose
with a 710-hp mid-engine supercar.
If you’re doing this all with the roof
down, as you should be, you’ll notice a
few other things. For one, it’s a damn
good convertible. The little targalike
roof flips over and stows on top of the
engine, under a cover of streamliner
humps. Ferrari has done a magnificent
job of controlling airflow in the cabin—
certainly better than McLaren has done
with its similarly priced and powered
720S Spider. Unlike with the carbon-
tubbed McLaren, though, you will
notice a bit of cowl shake in the alumi-
num-tubbed Ferrari, the only giveaway
from a chassis that traces its design back
to the 458 of a decade ago.
None of that factors into why you
should daily-drive your Ferrari, though.
That comes from the second-most
important of the myriad steering wheel
controls: Bumpy Road mode. The
magnetorheological shock absorbers
have the unmatched ability (sorry,
McLaren) to switch from a sporty or racy
ride to one comfortable enough for the
daily commute.
The ride smoothed and the transmis-
sion shifting itself, the only thing that
could make it a better GT car would be
a slightly wider frunk space that would
allow a standard-sized carry-on bag to lie
flat instead of at an angle, maximizing
available cargo space when you go away
for the weekend.
Get away? Won’t that put a lot of
miles on the car? Yeah, that’s the point.
Just like you wouldn’t care about lap
times when buying a convertible, so
too should you refuse to care about
the odometer. All supercars beg to be
driven, not stored, and convertibles like
the F8 Spider give you every reason,
excuse, and encouragement to do so. Q(Editor’s Note: The Ferrari arrived too
late to compete in the comparison test on
the previous pages.)Ferrari calls it the manettino. I call it dial-
a-drift; every click to the right lets you get
more sideways until you’re on your own.SEPTEMBER 2020 MOTORTREND.COM 51