So, this is a top-level Lamborghini supercar with a better power-to-weight ratio than the Bugatti Veyron – something to contemplate along with that £450,000 price tag. Predictably enough, it’s indecently fast in strictly objective terms – but it feels even quicker still.
Lamborghini’s press test drive was conducted exclusively at the Vallelunga autodrome near Rome in cars that couldn’t be driven elsewhere because they hadn’t been fully homologated or certified. I can only imagine what the Revuelto will feel like on the road, then – although if the disdainful way in which it seemed to furl up and spit out the circuit’s longer straights is any guide, ‘utterly berserk’ ought to just about cover it.
The pin-sharp, free- and fast-revving engine combines with the instantly accessible ‘torque fill’ of that electric front axle to achieve acceleration that’s as dramatic as it is unremittingly vigorous. It’s ‘on’ in an instant – and then it just keeps coming.
While Lamborghini V12s have traditionally needed revs to really let loose, this one has electric back-up, so the car simply rockets away from standing and even takes off from middling revs, on part throttle and in higher gears, with an astounding sense of muscle.
There’s still every reason to work that combustion engine, though – and a great deal of vivid, wonderful, effervescent V12 noise on offer when you do.
This car’s combustion engine feels very effectively joined and teamed with the new electric portion of its powertrain – and aided and augmented by it, not in any way at odds with it, and not out-dazzled by it either. The V12 remains the dominant, unrelenting, primary lure and strength of the car, just as it should be.
For brake feel, meanwhile, the Revuelto does have a ‘blended’ pedal that combines regenerative and friction braking (where other PHEV supercars have elected for conventional braking systems), but it doesn’t suffer from mushy, ill-defined pedal progression or a sudden, crude jump between one sort of retardation and another.
“We really focused on brake-pedal pressure, rather than travel, to define how and where we should blend in the friction brakes,” explains technical boss Mohr, “because nobody wants a sports car whose brakes don’t inspire your confidence.”
Suffice it to say, the Revuelto’s do – and, over admittedly short stints of laps, they also seemed to have the outright power and resistance to fade that you would hope for.