Ferrari SF90 Stradale (phev) Reviews

Joshua Dowling road tests and reviews the Ferrari 488 GTB in Italy.

Australians are buying a record number of mega-dollar supercars. But you better not be in a hurry if you want to buy one of the fastest Ferraris ever made.

They're the fastest growing -- and most profitable -- segment of the new-car market. So why is Ferrari steering clear?

Later this month Ferrari will show off its newest supercar, the 488 GTB, to Australian customers.First drive reviews suggest it's a more than worthy replacement for the fabulous 458. But if Italian supercars are not your style, brands from Germany, Japan, Britain and the US are lining up to tempt the supercar enthusiast.The second generation of Ingolstadt's supercar evolves the original design but is built around a new aluminium and carbon fibre space-frame. A 5.2-litre V10 engine sits behind the cabin and comes in two levels of tune: 397kW or 449kW, with the more powerful able to hit 100km/h in 3.2 seconds. A bright yellow example was on display at the MCG during the International Champions Cup at the weekend.Deliveries begin in the first quarter of 2016, with prices starting at about $370,000.The revived version of Honda's famous NSX from the 1990s will be a hybrid powered by a turbocharged 3.5-litre V6 engine in combination with three electric motors. One motor boosts engine output to the rear axle while the other two independently drive the front wheels. Where the original was all-aluminium, the new NSX will comprise a mix of carbon fibre, aluminium, steel and "other advanced materials". Deliveries begin next year, with prices expected to start around $250,000.The star of this year's Detroit motor show was designed by Australian Todd Willing, so it's a shame the GT is left-hand-drive only and cannot be road-registered here. That won't stop a few collectors signing up for the second revival of the famous Le Mans winning racer from the 1960s. Ford chose this year's event to announce it would use the new GT for another crack at the race next year.Road cars will be powered by a turbocharged V6 with about 450kW; overseas deliveries start next year.The British supercar specialist now has three strands to its model range, with the most accessible Sports Series comprising the recently unveiled 540C and 570S. The 570S is named for the output of its turbocharged 3.8-litre V8 in metric horsepower, equivalent to 419kW, and with a dry weight of just 1.3 tonnes it can reach 100km/h in 3.2 seconds. Australian deliveries begin next March, with prices at $408,000 (including NSW on-roads) for the 570S and $350,000 for the less powerful 540C.

They would have learned everything they need to know at the world's most successful new car show, the Goodwood Festival of Speed.Goodwood has been running for many years, but more recently it's morphed from a garden party at the stately home of the Earl of March into a genuine motor show which draws every major maker in the UK - and beyond.So what began as a chance for the owners of historic racing cars to exercise their old-timers is now a major event that draws more than 200,000 people each June on the same weekend as the Glastonbury music festival.Some fantastic retired racers still sprint up the Earl's driveway but it's the modern stuff which is drawing the big crowds and the big brands.Goodwood is an event and a destination, proving that cars are still more than just appliances for a lot of peopleMercedes-Benz uses the weekend to unveil its facelifted A45 AMG and new C63 S, Aston Martin rips the covers off its $2.5 million Vulcan and launches it up the hill, and Peugeot shows its 308 GTI for the first time. Mazda, which is the star brand at the show and has its Le Mans winning rotary 787B doing noisy demonstration runs, has its all-new MX-5 in action.There is also a moving motor show where ordinary fans can take a passenger ride and a supercar cavalcade including all of the world's most desirable cars, right up to the 400km/h Ferrari FXX K.And that's the real key to the Festival of Speed. The cars move and there is lots of interactivity for visitors, from off-road driving events to racing car simulators and even kiddie slides.Did I mention Ken 'Gymkhana' Block in the outrageous Ford Mustang that starred in his most-recent internet video hit?Old-school motor shows are just giant showrooms, but Goodwood is an event and a destination, proving that cars are still more than just appliances for a lot of people. If it can work in Britain then the same formula should be just as tasty in Australia.

Paul Gover road tests and reviews the Ferrari California T with specs, fuel consumption and verdict.

Ewan Kennedy road tests and reviews the 2015 Ferrari FF.

Ford has announced it is returning to the Le Mans 24 Hour race in 2016, exactly 50 years after its maiden victory at the famous French circuit.Bill Ford, the great-grandson of the company’s founder Henry Ford, jetted to Le Mans for the historic announcement on the eve of this year’s race which starts Saturday afternoon local time.But there is just one catch. Although Ford will return with a modern version of the GT supercar that defeated Ferrari with a 1-2-3 finish on home turf in 1966 (and went on to win the following three years in a row), it is not competing for outright honours next year.The front-runners in the modern Le Mans era are mega-dollar teams with budgets bigger than Formula One.Ford says it is making the historic return because motorsport is still important to the brand’s image.At this weekend’s race, Audi is aiming for its 14th win since 1999 (all of them with hi-tech diesel power since 2006) and the sixth year in a row, while Toyota and Porsche are racing hybrid supercars. Nissan, in an unusual move, is experimenting with a front-wheel-drive car (as in, all the power of the engine drives the front wheels, just like a Nissan Pulsar; the exact opposite of the world’s fastest race cars which send power to the rear wheels or, in the case of Le Mans, all four).Instead, Ford will race in the Le Mans 24 Hour category for modified road cars, in which Porsche 911s and Corvettes compete.But Ford says it is making the historic return because motorsport is still important to the brand’s image.“When the GT40 competed at Le Mans in the 1960s, Henry Ford II sought to prove Ford could beat endurance racing’s most legendary manufacturers,” said Bill Ford, executive chairman, Ford Motor Company. “We are still extremely proud of having won this iconic race four times in a row, and that same spirit that drove the innovation behind the first Ford GT still drives us today.”Ford plans to introduce 12 new performance vehicles between now and 2020.Although the road-going version of the Ford GT was designed by an Australian, the car will not be sold locally as it is not being built in right-hand-drive.The road-going version of the new Ford GT is not due on sale until next year but the company has revealed it has more computer power than a fighter jet.Instead, once the locally-made supercharged Ford Falcon XR8 goes out of production in October 2016, local Ford performance fans will have only the Mustang to choose from if they want a V8 with a Ford badge.

It is the biggest motor show on the planet, in every sense of the word.The site map for the Shanghai motor show looks straightforward enough. With its simple clover-leaf design, at first it appears there are four halls to cover.Then you discover the floorspace of each hall is the size of the MCG – and split in two sections under one enormous roof. So, eight enormous halls then.But if you fold out the map – as I did, on day two – you then learn there are two levels to every hall.So instead of covering two of eight halls on day one, it turns out I only made it to two out of gigantic 16 halls. Needless to say, the joint is huge.China overtook the US car market in 2009 and hasn't missed a gear since.So many Chinese can now afford a car that it has caused instant gridlockMore than 24.8 million new vehicles were delivered in China last year (compared to 1.1 million in Australia and 16.5 million in the US) and sales are still powering, up by more than 13 per cent in 2015.The country with 1.35 billion people is rapidly developing a middle class, and they want to switch from two wheels to four.So many Chinese can now afford a car that it has caused instant gridlock; the government often alternates days which allow cars with odd or even licence plates on the road.In Shanghai, a city of more than 23 million people, equivalent to the entire population of Australia, the traffic is so bad that the best way to get to the motor show is by train.We found this out the hard way, having taken more than two hours to travel by bus from the downtown hotel to the motor show site on day one; the train ride the next day took 20 minutes. So much for celebrating the car.But even the Shanghai train system, although infinitely more efficient than Australia's network, is suffering from growing pains.The local transport website helpfully points out that an English translation version of the train map is not available as a PDF because the city is adding so many new lines that it doesn't fit on an A4 sheet of paper.China is a place with big ambitions. While the Chinese auto industry is booming, that is largely because each of the top-selling brands have their hands held by a foreign car company.If you want to build and sell cars in China, the government mandates you must partner with a local manufacturer – and split the profit down the middle.You name the brand, and they're either already in China, or about to set up shopIt's one of the reasons China's middle class economy is growing so fast, the government ensures the wealth is distributed far and wide.When a foreign auto company turns up to start building cars, they are told which provinces they will set up their factories in, and which company will partner them.That's why you see some unusual acronyms after household names such as General Motors, Volkswagen, Toyota, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, Mazda, Mercedes-Benz, and BMW.The list goes on. You name the brand, and they're either already in China, or about to set up shop.Meanwhile, demand for imported luxury cars is so strong that brands such as Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche and Rolls-Royce now list China as their biggest market.At a previous motor show, Rolls-Royce had to install a credit card machine because so many cashed-up Chinese buyers wanted to drive home in the display cars on the spot.Just as Chinese have had to adjust to understanding the difference between a motor show and a dealership (Rolls-Royce took their deposits but delivered the cars later), the global industry has had to change its approach to such an important market and has developed models exclusively for sale in China.At the other end of the scale, dozens of China-only car brands are trying to leave their mark on the local market and, eventually, the world.Many of these brands are the ones responsible for the copycat cars that have been the butt of jokes in recent years.There was the fake Mini, the sincere form a flattery to the Range Rover Evoque, the BMW X5 nose that appeared to be grafted onto what was apparently a tribute to the Toyota Prado.However, apart from a handful of cars (one that had a Ferrari nose and a Porsche Cayman rear end, and another that looked like a Volkswagen Touareg SUV, except it wasn't) this year's show stood out for its lack of counterfeit cars.Indeed, the domestic Chinese car makers are showing signs of maturing.Would I rush out and buy a Chinese car? Not yetThe similarities in foreign design are still there, but they are much more muted and on their way – hopefully – to their own look.The smart brands are hiring foreign design talent (there appears to have been a raid on Audi, BMW and VW designers recently) to help nurture the extremely creative Chinese designers coming up through the system.But would I rush out and buy a Chinese car? Not yet. Probably not for several years. Maybe even a decade.It should be pointed out that, just as with big foreign brands, not all Chinese cars are created equally. Some are most certainly better than others.The Chinese automotive industry absolutely knows how to manufacture every single part that goes into making a carThat said, even the big improvers of the Chinese domestic brands are still a long way from challenging the German, Japanese, North American and South Korean brands on quality, safety, refinement and efficiency.The Chinese automotive industry absolutely knows how to manufacture every single part that goes into making a car – and give it the appearance of quality.But the world's biggest car market is still yet to hone the skills to design and engineer vehicles from the ground up to truly international standards.In the meantime, foreign design and engineering talent will be able to enjoy the China boom.Indeed, even Australia is getting a slice of the action.The new China-only Ford Taurus unveiled this week was created from the ground up in Australia.Ford employs 1500 designers, engineers and mechanics (twice as many employed on the production line that will fall silent next year) at Broadmeadows to develop cars for Ford of China.The only difference is the factory is 8000km away, rather than next door.

Craig Duff road tests and reviews the Ferrari FF with specs, fuel consumption and verdict.