The Purosangue is the most radical Ferrari yet, as the first four-seat four-door model to be graced by the Prancing Horse.
Although its proportions and functionality are unprecedented for Ferrari, it has retained some of the brand’s fundamental features, having a front-mid-mounted V12 and being claimed to be “a true sports car”.
Enrico Galliera, Ferrari’s marketing and commercial chief, said: “We believe it’s a game-changer. It has the performance of a sports car with the comfort and versatility of a less extreme car. For us, the strategy was to develop a sports car in a different segment.”
While Ferrari has a long history with 2+2 cars, most recently with the Roma, this is the first time a four-door model with four fully sized seats has made production.
The only previous four-door badged as a Ferrari was a Pininfarina-designed concept car of 1980, named the Pinin, which company founder Enzo Ferrari reportedly liked but never signed off.
Ferrari refuses to describe the Purosangue, which will start from £313,120, as an SUV, but the car’s proportions and functionality are very much intended for this segment – one in which Ferrari until now has been markedly absent while rivals such as Aston Martin, Lamborghini and Porsche have forged ahead to capitalise on the ever-growing worldwide popularity of SUVs.
The Purosangue is 4973mm long, 2028mm wide and 1589mm tall (compared with 5112mm, 2016mm and 1638mm for the Lamborghini Urus). Along with its 185mm of ground clearance, that puts it very much in SUV territory. It is also four-wheel drive.
V12 Performance
Ferrari has held true to its heritage, employing its revered V12 in the Purosangue. The naturally aspirated 12-cylinder engine is a heavily reworked version of that used in the 812 Superfast, with a 65deg angle between cylinder banks, a 6.5-litre capacity, a dry sump and high-pressure direct fuel injection.
It has been developed for the Purosangue to ensure that maximum torque is available at lower revs to counter the extra weight of an SUV while not losing the linear power typical of Ferrari’s V12s.
The engine is mounted behind the front axle, while the eight-speed dual-clutch automatic gearbox sits at the rear, creating a sporty transaxle layout. This helps deliver the 49:51 front-to-rear weight distribution that Ferrari engineers deem optimum for a front-mid-engined sports car.
The Purosangue becomes the most powerful SUV on sale, with its maximum power of 715bhp arriving at 7750rpm and its torque peaking at 528lb ft at 6250rpm.
In line with Ferrari’s claim that the Purosangue is a “true sports car”, it achieves the benchmark sprint of 0-62mph in just 3.3sec and 0-124mph in 10.6sec.
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Your money your choice, yes, I quoted this before, but it's true, if your happy with it, then that's fine Imb, if you don't blanche at the starting price, and have more than one Car, SUV or whatever, your not going to drive it that often, not all seriously wealthy people do no work, they might not be at home that often, so having something like this in your Garage is maybe something to look forward to when you get home, yes, it's a silly amount to pay for a Car anything infact, and, let's be honest, we may not buy this Ferrari, but, money no object, what's your choice?
Car looks incredible, but my only reservation is, not that it doesn’t have a sat-nav, but I question the practicality of a V12 in a daily driver? Let us be real, of a the Ferraris that are used for daily use, this is the one that has errand runner, school run shuttle, dinner with the folks and friends, etc., written all over it! Making those runs will not require the full use of that monster under the hood, but with no electrication and a lot of stop and go traffic, this SUV might only get the MPGs of a pickup built in the 1980s! Now, someone who can drop $400K+ for this vehicle is not worried about gas mileage. Yet, with the eco friendly climate of today, Ferrari could have created a lot of good will by adding some type of electrification to this amazing vehicle. Yes, maybe they do something like that in the future and adding batteries and an electric motor to an already fairly he vehicle, would go against their sporting nature of their SUV. Not having those things will not impact the sells of this vehicle, for that are probably already sold out until 2030!
Using this as a daily driver is pretty grotesque, let's be honest. But folk like the asshole in an X6 I saw yesterday doing 50 in a 20 zone in town don't care. This would be their dream car.