2009 Ferrari California First Drive

[mygold2u]

2009 Ferrari California First Drive

It is understandably important to Ferrari that the 2009 Ferrari California not be seen as a poseur's car. We've lost count of how many times Ferrari officials have stressed to us that this hardtop convertible is "a true Ferrari."

We can see why they'd worry. After all, the California is relatively hefty at 3,817 pounds. It is available with cruise control. And it carries standard child safety-seat attachments for the rear bucket seats.

Yet now that we've spent some 300-odd kilometers traversing some of Sicily's finest paved goat tracks in the 2009 Ferrari California, we have no qualms about calling this car a true Ferrari.

True, this front-engine hardtop convertible is not a "fantastic go-kart," as Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo describes the midengine F430, but neither is it some Lexus SC 430 dipped in secret Ferrari sauce.

It's Like the Music
Certainly none of the folks we encountered in our one-day drive of a 2009 Ferrari California (a pretty light-blue one) had any misgivings about the car being the genuine article. Although it is possible that we simply did not hear their complaints over our frantic and nearly constant revving of this car's 460-horsepower 4.3-liter V8.

Certainly, the guy begging his parents to shoot a picture of him in front of our parked car accepted the California as a true Ferrari. And when we started the car in front of him, he uttered perhaps the most clichéd description we can imagine for the sound of a Ferrari engine: "It's like music."

It sounds spectacular — like downshift-in-every-tunnel-and-floor-it spectacular. This engine is a version of the V8 that powers the F430, but with slightly larger bore and a bit less stroke and the addition of a direct-injection system. The net result is about 30 hp fewer. And the full allotment of 460 hp arrives at 7,750 rpm instead of the F430 motor's stratospheric 8,500-rpm power peak. Of course, the California's 4.3-liter V8 makes 357 pound-feet of torque — a 14 lb-ft advantage over the F430's engine. The V8 in the California also shares its block with the power plants of the Alfa-Romeo 8C Competizione and the Maserati GranTurismo (every Maserati model, actually).

For those who interpret these statistics to mean that the F430 motor is a truer expression of the Ferrari ideal than the California's V8, so be it. But it is only in comparison to the F430's engine that the California's V8 feels in any way wanting for power. Compared to convertibles like the California (the Aston Martin DB9 Volante, Bentley Continental GTC and Mercedes-Benz SL63 AMG, to name a few), the California's engine feels and sounds distinctly unencumbered in a uniquely Ferrari kind of way. There's an almost electric charge that zings through your synapses when you open up the throttle. It is intensely exhilarating.

In fact, this Ferrari V8 is good enough to make us almost warm up to the Lexus IS F-style, diagonally stacked exhaust finishers in the rear bumper. (As in the IS F, they're not actually connected to the exhaust system.)

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