Mark was right...

Twelfth Monkey · Mark was right...

http://www.autocar.co.uk/CarRevie...-Gallardo-5.2-V10-LP550-2/242307/

The only thing you notice other than that is that the steering talks more and it has a slightly tail-down stance compared with the stock car. Find some corners and you find out why this is and just how much it accentuates its differences over its all-wheel-drive siblings.

The first series of quick bends are revealing: the Balboni car instantly makes even Gallardos feel cumbersome and ponderous. They’re not, of course. They’re among the sharpest-handling machines around, but the LP550-2 is simply brilliant.

Its diff-less front end does an astonishingly good job of gathering every scrap of crucial, real-time info on what’s happening at the contact patch, then sending it up the steering column. It turns in to a corner much harder, initially, than the standard Gallardo and then lets you choose your stance on the way out.

There’s no more waiting until you’ve convinced the centre diff to send as much drive rearwards as possible. Now, all that power has no alternative, and that lets you adopt a wonderfully neutral, accurate cornering stance.

And, when the road suddenly changes direction, the LP550-2 becomes incandescent, delightfully flicking through the direction changes, biting hard at the front end to start things, easing its weight to the back, then firing out again.

It’s not that it’s faster point to point than the all-paw car, because it’s probably, almost certainly, not. But it feels like it is. There’s an unapologetic joy about it and you can’t help but being slapped in the face by how much lighter, more agile and more entertaining it feels.

For all that, though, it’s not a tail-happy drift king unless that’s what you provoke from it. The ESP intervention point may be higher than it is in the standard car, but it’s still there; it just lets go of the reins faster after it has done its job than in the stock car.

There’s a Sport mode, of course, which shifts faster and, ironically, more smoothly than in standard (or in the dead-ordinary Automatic mode), and the Corsa track mode is even more aggressive again. Still, it’s nowhere near a Ferrari 430 Scuderia in terms of shift times.

The only sensible place to even try to slide the tail is on the exits of second-gear bends, but the ESP software in Corsa mode keeps it in check very well and it always feels stable and safe even when it’s sliding.

The really odd thing is that it’s so much fun this way that you start to wonder whether the Gallardo was originally designed with this layout in mind or whether they’ve just done a superb conversion.

Should I buy one?
Oh, yes. By any means you can, yes.

Admittedly, I'm not persuaded that my car would be a better fit for my life and driving style with 2wd, but that's quite a review. Horrible colour & stripes, though.

Dr. Hfuhruhurr

I would absolutely love one, if only someone else would pay the bills.

Gurney

Love the colour, ditch the stripes.

TimR

"him"

TimR