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New Ferrari 296 Speciale – could this really be the most exciting Ferrari ever?
May 17, 2025
Ferrari promises that the new 296 Speciale will deliver the biggest driving thrill of any of its road cars yet. Can it live up to the mesmerising 458 Speciale, and other Ferrari road racers that have gone before? Here's Yousuf Ashraf with a detailed preview.
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0:00
It's the impossible question. What's the best driver's car ever made
0:05
Something that stands above everything as the most memorable, most fun and just plain exciting car of all time
0:12
Believe it or not, there might actually be an answer. The Ferrari 458 Speciale
0:18
It's the high point of Ferrari supercars, a naturally aspirated screamer that's so alive, so focused and takes you to places that pretty much nothing else can
0:27
It's the only car that's won Evo Car of the Year unanimously and nothing less than a legend
0:34
So if anything is going to carry that Speciale badge, it needs to be pretty spectacular
0:39
And this thing really is. Meet the 296 Speciale. Ferrari has not held back here
0:53
It says the 296 Speciale is the most thrilling Ferrari road car ever
0:59
So forget your LaFerraris and F40s, this apparently beats them all. That's a huge claim, but then the 296 does come from a stunning lineage of Ferraris
1:09
following the footsteps of the 360CS, the 430 Scuderia, 458 Speciale, and the 488 Pista
1:17
So you know the formula of these track-spec mid-engine Ferraris by now
1:20
It's essentially a GT3 RS treatment for the 296, so that means more aero, more carbon, more power, a completely overhauled chassis as well
1:29
But this thing is way more extreme than anything we've seen before. So around Fiorano, it's actually quicker than a LaFerrari
1:35
It's got loads of bits of the F80 to make that possible. So we'll start with the engine
1:39
It's the same V6 that you got on the 296, still 120 degree V angle, twin turbos, but it's got more power
1:46
Of course it has. It's got 690 horsepower from the engine alone
1:50
but the electric motor has been tweaked as well. So that's got even more power too
1:54
868 BHP that a nice round figure and that 50 BHP more than the 296 And the engine been lightened as well so it got the same titanium conrods as the f80 the block and the crankcase
2:05
have been trimmed down and it's got the same turbine housing as the f80 as well so overall
2:10
you're talking about a nine kilogram saving and as usual there are loads of carbon fiber options
2:15
to spend money on as well to lighten the car further and a titanium rear silencer overall
2:20
they're saying 1410 kilos dry for the 296 Speciale. Now we've weighed a 296 GTB at about
2:27
1611 kilos. They're saying this is 60 kilos lighter than that, so call it about 1550 in real terms
2:33
It doesn't take a genius to work out that those figures result in an unbelievably quick car
2:39
62 comes up in just 2.8 seconds, but even more impressive is the 124 mile an hour time
2:45
7 seconds flat, which isn't far off a LaFerrari. But the 296 has always had incredible numbers
2:52
and what people will be more concerned about is the engine itself. The idea of a super special Ferrari road car with a little V6 doesn't sound appealing
3:02
even if it is related to the one in Ferrari's Le Mans car. Ferrari doesn't seem bothered
3:07
Sit down, drive it, and then we talk, is what they told us
3:11
And to be fair, if you've driven a 296, you'll know that this V6 is a lovely, sweet-sounding motor in practice
3:19
And obviously, to manage all that performance, the Speciale's got more downforce
3:23
But as you can see, it doesn't really look like a race car for the road in the way that a GT3 RS does
3:28
There's no massive splitters and wings all over it because the aero work is going on underneath the car
3:33
So at the front, we've got an undertray which pulls air through the bonnet to generate downforce
3:38
You've got these louvres here to relieve air pressure from inside the wheel arches
3:41
Down the side it's quite clean, you've got this intake, this carbon sill here
3:45
And at the rear you've got these FXXK inspired winglets and a massive diffuser as well
3:50
And both of these work with the same deployable spoiler that you get in the standard 296 but it got a new middle position to give the car more stability at high speed And overall we talking 435 kilograms of downforce at 155 miles an hour
4:05
So maybe not the absolute peak numbers of a GT3 RS, but still 20% more than a standard 296
4:12
This is a track car, so a lot of work has gone into keeping things cool as well
4:17
Ferrari has opened up the front radiator ducts and cooling vents for the brakes
4:20
and even the suspension arms get new deflectors to direct air onto the discs
4:25
All of that is useful when you're kicking out numbers you'd expect from a full-blown hypercar
4:30
We've spoken a lot about performance and what made the 458 Speciale so fun to drive
4:35
was the fact that it was super exploitable as well as quick. You can almost drive it like a big, powerful, noisy Toyota GR86
4:43
And the 296 is a great base to build from and Ferrari's applied a more aggressive chassis setup
4:49
so we've got GT3 derived multi-matic dampers all round. We've got a 5mm lower ride height
4:54
new spring rates and Ferrari's latest chassis systems as well. So we've got side slip control
4:59
nine, we've got an e-diff and we've got ABS Evo as well and there's more stuff to play with inside
5:05
Right, 296 Speciale. Wow, it's very bare in here. There's lots of bare carbon
5:16
no carpets these seats i think i remember them from the setto fiorano car these kind of carbon
5:23
shelled fixed seats with the harnesses man it does feel cool in here you've still got actually you
5:27
don't have haptic buttons in this car you've got physical switch gear from the f80 i recognize
5:33
these generally it's a very focused environment you've also got this manatino here which has the
5:38
same modes that you'll find in the standard 296 so it goes from electric mode hybrid performance
5:45
and then Qualify, which is like the all singing, all dancing, full battery power mode
5:50
But this car also has a boost mode as well, which kind of gauges when you need the electrical deployment from the battery on a track and deploys it at the most useful point So that the main differentiator with the modes in terms of the 296 Speciale
6:06
And we've got the same eight-speed DCT box as the standard 296
6:10
just with a slightly revised shift calibration. And this bare carbon door panel as well
6:16
which seems to have holes drilled in it for the speakers, which is quite cool
6:21
And speaking of sound, the standard 296 sounds really sweet. It's almost like a baby V12, they call it
6:27
It doesn't sound as good as the full-fat V12s, but it doesn't sound very raw
6:31
And I think with this car, they're trying to bring some of that rawness back. So apparently it has a higher crescendo at the top end, even though it revs to 8.5
6:39
That crescendo should be a bit crisper. And they've given it new ducts from the engine into the interior
6:45
to give you much more of like kind of induction, engine noise, that kind of thing inside the car
6:49
and that's the challenge isn't it with these modern supercars with noise and emissions
6:53
regulations and having to put cats in and restrict the exhaust systems but if you can get the sound
6:58
inside the car that's what we all want to hear isn't it without being antisocial. Will it sound
7:03
as good as a 458 Speciale? Probably not but I think it'll sound great nonetheless
7:10
So on the face of it this is a proper Speciale. It could be a worthy successor to the 458 but it
7:17
It makes me wonder, has Ferrari got its priorities straight with the F80
7:22
Because that's a bigger car than this, heavier, more complicated, four-wheel drive with the same engine
7:28
Could this thing be a more satisfying, more fun road car than the big hyper car
7:32
Who knows? But it will cost a lot less than an F80 at €400,000 in Italy
7:37
Or you can buy a Spyder version for €460,000. So what an amazing era we're in at the moment
7:44
We've got this, we've got McLaren 750S, Lamborghini Temerario around the corner as well
7:49
And these are cars that we just didn't expect to still be seeing five or six years ago
7:53
It's an amazing era for supercars and this could end up being one of the best
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