Yes, truly a WTF! Moment or should I say moments. Get the plural? And yes, there’s no typo on 458s. That’s plural too. Ferrari has just given new meaning to phrase “fiery red” to describe their cars.

The 458 Italia might be the company’s ultimate driving machine to date but a series of fires has seen 10 units of the 458 go up in flames and burn to the ground.

But get this, the fires have varied causes not necessarily caused by the car leading some superstitious people to think of the car as jinxed.

The BBC website featured a slideshow showcasing pictures of several 458s burn from all over the world. Those included one involved in a fire in Paris and another one in London. 8 other incidents were reported by other news outfits.

Ferrari is reported to be aware of the cases and is doing their own investigation.

And Ferrari did it again. They made Rubens Barrichello do it for Michael Schumacher and they made Felipe Massa do it for Fernando Alonso in the recent German GP.

Ferrari should have been content with the one-two finish but they had to make Alonso come out on top. The pass came on lap 49. Alonso easily overtook Massa in turn six.

Ferrari race engineer Rob Smedley allegedly told Massa, “Fernando is faster than you. Can you confirm you understood that message?” While Massa argues that his decision to let Alonso pass was his own, the message from Smedley does come off as a violation.

The case has now been forwarded to the World Motor Sport Council and Ferrari’s slapped with a $100,000 fine. It’s not as dramatic as the dead-heat attempt done by Barrichello and Schumacher but it’s twice as ugly for Ferrari.

There’s nothing like reading news about super pricey supercars getting effed up. We do find it sort of amusing (even hilarious) when it’s because of middle-aged millionaire who have nary the driving skill for such beasts crashing them.

But sometimes, it can be the automaker’s fault. How many Lambos have we seen burnt to a crisp? Now, we’re not sure yet if this was Ferrari’s fault or the drivers but check out the charred remains of what used to be a brand spanking new Ferrari 458 Italia.

This happened in France. The engine caught fire after the car was taken through a mountain pass. We can all just wonder if the 570 hp 4.5L V8 was to blame for the car’s demise.

It’s inevitable. A faster version of Ferrari’s new road car – the 458 – is coming and it’s finally here. Check out the new 458 Challenge. It’s basically a meaner and faster version of the Italia tweaked to participate in various race series starting 2011.

The Challenge packs the same direct-injection 4.5L V8 engine in the regular car that dishes out 562 bhp and 9000 rpm. The Formula 1-style gearbox has been revised to feature racier gear ratios and

The car’s put on a diet too with panel thickness reduced and increased use of carbon fiber and Lexan (plexiglass). The suspension’s stiffer, a lower ride height, and Brembo brakes from the 599XX.

Its performance promises to be even better than the old F430 Challenge car, lapping the Fiorano test track in just 1:16.5 – two seconds quicker than the F430 Challenge.

Ferrari might not be performing as well as they would’ve expected this season even with a powerhouse line up of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso. But that isn’t deterring the drivers especially Massa from staying with Scuderia.

Massa, who has made an impressive comeback since his accident in the 2009 season, has decided to stay with Ferrari until the 2012 season.

“I am happy to be given the opportunity to drive for Ferrari for a further two seasons,” said Massa.

Massa posted quite an impressive resume since joining Ferrari in 2001. He has driven in 69 races, winning 11, finishing for a podium spot in 30 and started at pole in 15.

Luca di Montezemolo’s dropping five bombs a minute about his company. With the rest of the industry going green, it’s interesting how supercar firms like Ferrari would be adapting to the changes. Ferrari’s already experimented with biofuel and hybrid tech but that doesn’t rule out other tech enhancements.

A V6 remains a possibility. Currently, Ferrari’s only slapping V8s as their smallest engines but V6s have been part of Ferrari’s automotive history. Ferrari has previously announced that it is still considering turbocharging but only if they figure out a way to deal with turbo lag.

“Turbocharging could be the answer and with the V8 we’re confident that we can achieve impressive consumption and emissions through technology, innovation and electronics,” he said.

One of the reasons why Ferrari wants reforms in F1 and opposes the budget cap is to use the sport as their laboratory for experimenting with technology. Di Montezemolo believes that the sport offers the best venue to try new things out.

Luca di Montezemolo’s got the cred to call out all the Formula One new teams. He’s running Ferrari and Ferrari’s like the Real Madrid of motorsports. In an interview, di Montezemolo hinted that other cars were a ‘joke’.

The Ferrari boss wants changes in the sport like adding a third car in the field instead of letting smaller teams (which have proven to be unable to cope with the technical superiority of the more established teams).

Ferrari and the other teams have been ardently critical of the budget caps intended to level the playing field for smaller teams.

“There is a need to have compettive teams,” he said. “F1 is like soccer. It needs heroes and it needs big teams. You cannot equalize everything. We need to avoid having too many small teams as it means too many compromises.”

He’s also in favor of shorter races.

Source: Autocar

Porsche has the Panamera. Aston Martin has the Rapide. Lambo at least attempted one with the Estoque. Ferrari, however, emphasizes that it’s not interested in making superfast saloons.

“As Enzo would say, we will never do four doors,” said Ferrai exec Amedeo Felisa. “And we will keep this tradition.”

Ferrari’s been fiddling around with some new stuff – stuff that hasn’t really been part of it’s tradition. They’re set to create a hybrid and even integrate fuel-saving technologies. Felisa claims that they have no choice but to build one due to increasing legislation.

As for four-doors, no one’s forcing them to make one and they will not make one. Felisa further said that no one’s really interested in a four-door Ferrari. At least you got to admire how they keep true to what their founder envisioned.

Oh before you flip a bird at Porsche and Pagani’s way, keep in mind that the 599XX isn’t a production vehicle and doesn’t qualify to compete with other production cars’ lap times.

Still, the 6:58 lap time is nothing short of astonishing. With that, Ferrari can claim that the 599XX is the fastest “production-derived” sports car to ever lap the ring,

Only the scary Radical SR8 has been known to go faster and we all know how the Radical will never be used as a daily-driven car anyway.

The Ferrari is powered by a 6.0L V12 that dishes out 700 hp and the engine is mated to a super quick F1-based gearbox that allows for 60 millisecond shift times.

Check out the Ferrari 599XX lap video.

Ferrari will not be stopping developing their road cars. With parent company Fiat all about pushing forward, Ferraro is set to produce six new models as part of Fiat’s five-year plan.

Among the models are a new Enzo, a more aggressive 458, a 458 Spider, a new version of the 612 Scaglietti, a new 599 GTB Fiorano, and Ferrari’s first hybrid variant.

Perhaps much anticipated will be the new Enzo since the flagship needed some major upgrades after being trounced by several models already. Remember how the F430 Scuderia actually shaves time off the Enzo’s lap and how the new 599 GTO is the fastest in the fleet right now?

Ferrari’s embraced the green side, by introducing a 599 hybrid at Geneva earlier in the year but reports peg the hybrid to be a four-seater.

With these plans, Ferrari will maintain its current range of the 458, the 599, the 612 and the California with the new Enzo standing in as a special model.

Source: Autocar

The name Luca di Montezemolo might be more associated with Ferrari these days but the fact is, he’s Fiat’s top honcho serving as chairman. That, however, will not be long.

In a company announcement, Fiat announced that di Montezemolo will be stepping down as chairman. He will, however, remain in the board and continue to head Ferrari.

This move is in the eve of Fiat’s unveiling of Fiat Group’s five-year plan. Di Montezemolo claims that he’s finished the task he’s set out to do thus his resignation as chair.

However, scoop from Automotive News says that the real reason is that di Montezemolo doesn’t appear to be on the level with Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne’s directions for the company. Juicy!

If you’re one of those lucky millionaires (despite the economy) and wanted to own one of the fastest production Ferrari’s ever built, then you should’ve ordered one just when it launched.

Never mind the expected £300,000 price tag, the Ferrari 599 GTO just sold out. And the car has yet to make a public appearance (which is scheduled at the upcoming Beijiing Motor Show).

The 599 GTO is powered by a 6L V12 that dishes out 661 bhp and 457 lb-ft of torque. That much power allows the car to zip to 60 mph from standstill in just 3.4 seconds and blow past 200 mph.

The engine’s mated to a six-speed gearbox that changes gears faster than you can blink. And yes, that title of fastest road-going Ferrari means that it’s quicker than the Enzo. Around the Fiorano track, the 599 GTO edges the Enzo by a second.

The new Ferrari 599 GTO was supposed to be showcased at the Geneva motor show earlier this month but Ferrari decided to showcase a hybrid version of the 599 that packs the massive V12. (Yeah, that’s a V12 hybrid.)

The GTO is set to be the sportier of the 599 – more focused version than the 599 GTB and the 599 HGTE (the hybrid). The car will be dishing out at least 650 bhp. The max torque from the engine is also expected to be more than the other 599 models.

For better track performance, the car is also put on a diet. Weight is expected to be less than 3,640 lbs. For a car with a V12, that’s pretty light. Helping to stop the car are new brake pads that were initially seen in the 599XX.

The car will also pack new software to trim the shift times even more and aero upgrades are expected to be slapped on the car.

Image Credit: FastLaneDaily

So Ferrari’s already working on a hybrid 599. They’ve also considered turbocharging (and I love their thrust to solve turbo lag). Now the company is looking into slapping on V6 engines to their cars.

Ferrari boss Amedeo Felisa said “If I had to answer the question a year ago I would have said no, but attitudes are changing and we build cars for customers. In 20 years, who can say?”

While this really ins’t a confirmation that they will be slapping on V6s anytime soon, at least we know that it’s not going to be a real ideological issue. And about the electric issue, Felisa said, “We will not make engine sounds with speakers.” Bravo, Felisa.

Felisa also confirmed that in their pipeline are an open-topped 458 Italia and an Enzo replacement are both under way. I would love to see how they lop the top off the 458. It sure looks exquisite as a hard top. I hope it just translates well to an open top.

We can all just savor this photo rendering by Job Sibal.

Well, you can’t expect to fight the growing market trends and still be the preferred brand. Ferrari has officially joined in on the rest of the automaking world by building a hybrid.

Ferrari will be showcasing a Ferrari 599 hybrid at the Geneva motor show next month. The car is considered to be a concrete manifestation of Ferrari’s intent on developing hybrid technology.

The electric motor is reported to help cut fuel consumption by as much as 35%. Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo announced back in July of last year that Ferrari wants to cut fleet-wide emission figures by 40% by 2012.

Green cars aren’t really that alien to Ferrari. Remember the biofuel Ferrari F430 Spider?

When Schumacher retired, Fernando Alonso could’ve relished the fact that he was the best driver in Formula 1 but deep inside him, he probably knew that he wasn’t the best driver in the world. That even though the maestro opted out, Michael Schumacher will still be the best driver out there.

Alonso has two championships under his belt but Schumacher has seven and can probably hike it up to eight now that the maestro’s back driving for Ross Brawn with Mercedes GP next season.

Alonso knows he has unfinished busienss with Schumacher and says he’s looking forward to compete against Schumacher. Alonso will be driving for Ferrari starting next season.

“To beat a legend is very motivating. Now he’s back it’s very special,” Alonso said.

Source: BBC

Fiat isn’t joking when they said they’ll be utilizing Chrysler to bring in their European badges on US soil. Just check out what’s actually the best thing Chrysler has had on a motor show stand for years – the Ferrari 599XX.

That is absolutely soooweeet!

The 599XX is an absolute beast. The car packs a 6.0L V12 dishing out a wicked 700 hp with a max torque of 479 lb-ft. For added racing goodness, Ferrari slapped on a new F1-bbased gearbox that cuts down gear changes to 60 ms – faster than you can blink your eye.

Fiat boss, Sergio Marchione is still working on ways to optimize how to play out the brands and badges across the two continents but one thing that Fiat will obviously be exploiting is Chrysler’s dealership network.

Too bad they didn’t feature the Ferrari 458 Italia.

One of the cornerstones of Ferrari engineering is to get the most out of its engines without having to resort to turbochargers. Its best cars like the Enzo, the F430 and the new 458 Italia have remained defiantly naturally-aspirated.

That’s pretty much why the V12 and V8 bellows have remained pure without any annoying whirr of force-fed air and Ferraris never had to worry about turbo lag. But things might change soon.

The firm is now considering using turbos for future models. However, one of their biggest hurdles is to deal with the turbo lag citing that any sort of delay on delivering power is unacceptable for Ferrari.

Now that’s basically what Ferrari is all about – engineering perfection.

Source: Autocar

Oh yeah. That kind of headline surprised us too. Ferrari with a 4×4 system. It’s a good thing this effort isn’t really for an SUV. It’s for their future GT models.

With all the greening efforts going around, Ferrari has also jumped into creating hybrid systems for their front-engined GTs and they figure that a 4×4 system is best mated to the hybrid powerplant.

But here’s the part why I like Ferrari – they claim that using the electric motors for the front wheels will not really help improve fuel economy but they are more interested in using the electric motors’ torque for acceleration and cornering.

So basically, turning their thoroughbred cars in hybrids won’t make them soft green cars after all.

Word has it that their 612 replacement will be among the first to get a hybrid treatment. So that would probably mean dropping the V12 for a V8 and slapping on some electric motors.

There’s a lot of websites to go to if you want to waste a few minutes but car customizer sites are always a welcome destination for geeky gearheads.

Ferrari has just launched its customizer microsite for the newly-launched 458 Italia. And if you don’t have a quarter of a million dollars to buy the car, at least settle for a a few mouse clicks and customize the car to your liking.

The application allows you to customize the exterior including the paint, wheels and exterior options. It also allows you to tweak the interior including the colors, materials, seat styling, the carpeting and the trim. The options even include Alcantara for some of the panels. Nice!

The 458 is set to be the replacement for the F430. It packs a 4.5L V8 that dishes out 570 hp and is considered as the highest-revving Ferrari ever. The engine’s mated to a seven-speed gearbox allowing it to go from 0 to 62 mph in 3.4 seconds and a top speed of 202 mph.

Check out the microsite here.

Ferrari hasn’t even rolled out the hard top version and yet they dish out another reason to highly anticipate the yet another variant of the car – the Ferrari 458 Italia Spider.

Too bad it will be within two more years after the hardtop for Ferrari to launch the soft-top version.

The 458 Italia packs a 4.5L V8 engine that dishes out 562 bhp and is the company’s highest-revving Ferrari road car. If the car would maintain the power numbers, it would require some really fantastic engineering to maintain the handling and performance.

Typically, cabrios take a bit of hardtops’ edge off with all the added weight and support to accommodate the structural functions of the roof.

But if there’s something Ferrari knows, it’s maintaining the handling and performance of the hard top. Just check out the car replaced by the 458 – the F430. The soft-top can easily go toe to toe with the hard top.

Source: Autocar

You can only do so much to tune a Ferrari for it not to look like a riced-up exotic. But if you’re going to slap on some bits on your Ferrari, better make sure it’s done by those who know what they’re doing.

Japanese tuner ASI is set to deliver a body kit for the Ferrari 458 Italia. The car isn’t even available yet but for those who want to add more flairs on the car, ASI has you covered.

ASI restyled the front bumper to make it look like an Enzo. The mad thing about the Japanese is that, it’s not even purely aesthetic, it helps on the aerodynamics too. The intakes deform at high speeds in order to reduce drag.

To wrap the kit up, it includes a rear spoiler and the rims have been sprayed with black paint.

ASI has been doing Ferrari body kits for quite some time now and has been quite good at it with many of their past works known to have improved the aero and lightweightedness of the cars.

Source: Autocar

With Massa out for the season, Schumacher no hopes of a comeback this season, and Badoer driving badly, Ferrari had to make some real moves to even be near of a competitor that it was last season. Their latest move – get Giancarlo Fisichella.

And that they did. After a flurry of talks, Force India has released Fisichella from his contract to race for Ferrari. Fisichella will be on board a Ferrari car come the Italian Grand Prix.

Fisichella had quite the race in the last grabbing pole in Belgium and dueling it out with Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen before settling for second. Talks of a Ferrari move suddenly sprung out since then and intensified when Massa has been ruled out of the season.

No word yet on who will be replacing Fisichella to drive with Adrian Sutil but test driver Vitantonio Liuzzi is a likely possibility. Force India can only hope that Liuzzi wouldn’t turn out as badly as Badoer has done for Ferrari.

Michael Schumacher might not be of no use for the Ferrari F1 team this season but there’s a lot more reason for Ferrari to keep him around. Well, he did cause quite the publicity for Ferrari driving the FXXeil Evoluzione around the Top Gear track as the Stig. He is more than enough of a draw as far as endorsing cars is concerned.

Ferrari has recently unveiled the new F430 replacement – the Ferrari 458 Italia. Given the reputation of its predecessor, it’s got much to uphold. The car is powered by a 570-hp V8 mated to a 7-speed gearbox enabling the car to go from 0 to 62 mph in 3.4 seconds and a top speed of 202 mph.

Check out this video of Schumi talking about the car.

When Ferrari released the official photos of the new Ferrari 458 Italia as the replacement to the Ferrari F430, all we can say is that it looks exquisite. And going by Jeremy Clarkson’s logic, the 458 is poised to be quite the car given that Ferrari’s own Formula One team is sucking badly this season. (Good Ferrari road cars just so happen to come while their F1 team is doing badly.)

Part of what Ferrari is hyping in the 458 is its aerodynamics. The car is supposed to be able to get massive downforce meaning that the car will be more planted to the ground to help both speed and handling. Technical director Roberto Fedeli claims, “The distribution of the downforce on the axle is very close to the weight distribution.”

The 458 packs 4.5L V8 which dishes out 562 bhp at 9000 rpm. It revs 500 rpms more than the old F430 making it the highest-revving Ferrari road car. That power allows the car to get from 0-62 in just 3.4 seconds and blast the hypercar benchmark of a 200 mph top speed.

As for the handling, Ferrari claims that the controls of the 458 is sharper than the F430 it replaces. And that should mean something, the F430 (especially the Scuderia) is already one razor sharp car and, if Ferrari really improved on that, then the 458′s sharpness must be biblical.

Source: Autoblog