Geneva Motor Show: Ballistic Switzerland
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Feeling blue? In these troubled times, some use Prozac, others use Zoloft, or Budweiser. For car enthusiasts, nothing cheers them up more than horsepower; for them, this year’s Geneva Motor Show is the mother of all happy pills.
Speaking of blue: In recognition of its centennial year, Bugatti on Tuesday unveiled its one-off Bleu Centenaire, with its unique gloss and flat paint scheme in the traditional French racing blue. Mechanically identical to the off-the-lot Veyron –- 1001 hp, 253 mph –- the Centenaire has polished anodized aluminum brightwork and lacquer-red brake calipers, “snowbeige” leather interior, park distance assist and a rearview camera. As one of the only humans to have ever parallel-parked a Veyron, I cannot tell you how exciting the last two items are. And all that for a mere $1.7 million. We’ll take that in petrodollars, please.
A footnote on the whole “centenaire” thing: Yes, it’s been 100 years since dear old Ettore opened up the doors of the old factory in Molsheim, France. But the press release is slightly misleading on the company’s ancestral home. The current factory is...
...in the nearby village of Dorsheim, and the maison there is the site of the old sales office. The hallowed ground in Molsheim now belongs to an aviation subcontractor. Alors.
Meanwhile, over on the Ferrari stand, they’ve taken a steel-spined wondercar and made it several degrees of harder, faster and crazier. The 599 GTB Fiorano with the Handling Gran Turismo Evoluzione (HGTE) package features grippier tires, firmer settings for the magnetorheological dampers, bigger anti-roll bars, lower ride height and a significant program of weight-saving carbon fiber doodads and furbelows. The press release says the “exhaust silencer has also been modified with the result producing an even more marked and thrilling sound under hard usage,” which sounds to me like the ‘silencer’ has been removed.
Look, the problem with the Lamborghini Murcielago LP 640 is that it’s too anonymous, too subtle, too introverted. Poor thing. Maybe it should try Dale Carnegie. But wait, Lambo corporate has a solution. Called the Murcielago LP 670-4 Super Veloce, it’s a quite-mental version of the car with an extra 30 hp (to 670 hp) and a Slimfast program worth about 220 pounds. The result is a power-to-weight ratio of 5.1 pounds per hp and a 0-60 mph time of 3.2 seconds. Bet that’s noisy.
In addition to some highly naughty composite body work – like hexagonal polycarbonate plates over the engine -- the Super Veloce offers a choice of two ground effects packages. With the standard aero wing –- small, about the size of a coffee table –- top speed is 212 mph, Lambo says. For lots of downforce, with a little more aero drag, the big wing package reduces top speed to a mere 209 mph. I guess that’s for grandma.
-- Dan Neil
Photos by Bugatti, Ferrari Lamborghini