The first Ferrari Sergio has arrived in the United Arab Emirates.

The first Ferrari Sergio has arrived in the United Arab Emirates. It has been delivered today to its new owner, the SBH Royal Auto Gallery in the UAE, at Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina Circuit, where the Finali Mondiali Ferrari are being staged and which is home to the Ferrari World theme park.  

Designed by Pininfarina, just six of this incredibly limited edition roadster are being built. The car was created to celebrate the spirit and core values of the historic Cambiano company in the 60th anniversary year of its collaboration with the Prancing Horse. Needless to say, Sergio was the only possible choice of name for the model, in homage to great Sergio Pininfarina, who sealed the unique, longstanding partnership with Ferrari. 

The Ferrari Sergio is a genuinely radical car. It is both exclusive and spare in the sense that every single element aboard is focused entirely on performance. An authentic open-top, it explicitly references the track, underscoring and intensifying its sense of sportiness, fun behind the wheel and the pleasure of design at its purest.  

The Ferrari Sergio’s performance and dynamics are excellent in the extreme too. It is based on the 458 Spider and retains the latter’s technological content as well as all of the functional aspects of its cockpit. It is powered by the latest 605 hp version of Ferrari’s naturally aspirated 4497 cc V8 which has won the International Engine of the Year award on three consecutive occasions. This power unit also guarantees the car sprints from 0 to 100 km/h in just 3 seconds. 

The Ferrari Sergio has an extremely simple, clear style. Both its volumes and treatments of its surfaces reflect the spirt of Pininfarina’s 1960s and 70s creations for Ferrari. Its proportions have been pushed to the extreme with the front of the car seeming to penetrate the rear which itself projects forward. 

The result is an exceptionally sculptural, three-dimensional take on the classic roadster. The two bodyshell masses are melded together via a longitudinal black insert, the main styling cue of the design.  The flank is also characterised by the same black longitudinal element which acts as both a dividing and unifying element between front and rear. The two sections of the car flow effortlessly into one another resulting in sublimely harmonious yet extremely muscular forms.

As with all Ferraris, the Sergio’s design was never an end in itself but is a marriage of function and aesthetics. The semi-floating development of the front spoiler beneath the bonnet balances downforce and optimises heat exchange. The roll-bar is a modern take on the classic Ferrari flying buttress and negative rear window.  Integrated into the roll-bars are the air intakes for clutch and gearbox oil cooling.  Lastly, the rear nolder and rear extractor generate downforce, adding an efficient finishing flourish to the car’s design.  

At the front of the car, Pininfarina has integrated the headlights in a classic move, turning them into a single transparent transverse element, a signature of the car’s extreme formal purity. At the rear, the circular tail lights are another modern nod to Ferrari history.  The two-tone theme continues on both the front bonnet and rear deck with the latter featuring the iconic circular air vents seen on other iconic Pininfarina creations from the past.

The cockpit is pared-back and functional in the extreme with the engine compartment actually hugging the backs of the seats. The example delivered to Abu Dhabi has three-layer red exterior paintwork and an extremely sporty cockpit with black leather upholstery with contrasting red stitching, Alcantara seat inserts, and extensive carbon dash and door well trim. It also features Sergio-specific forged wheels, in this instance gold in colour with a diamond finish.

Each one of the six Ferrari Sergios was configured by its owner in dedicated sessions at the Tailor Made atelier in Maranello where clients are invited to personalise their cars to their own individual tastes. The atelier offers enormous freedom of choice in terms of colours, materials and finishes. As a result, every detail is extremely exclusive, thereby continuing the Prancing Horse tradition begun in the 1950s and 60s of creating bespoke cars minutely tailored to each client’s wishes. 

World Premiere of the new FXX K at the Ferrari Mondiali in Abu Dhabi.

Ferrari’s new FXX K research and development programme receives its world premiere next weekend at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi. The laboratory-car is based on Maranello’s first hybrid model and will grace the world’s tracks from next year onwards. The K in its moniker is a reference to the “KERS” kinetic energy recovery system it adopts in maximising its track performance.  

Unfettered by homologation and racing regulations, the FXX K will never be used in competition. It was, in fact, developed to be completely uncompromising, incorporating technological innovations that will guarantee an unprecedented driving experience to the exclusive group of Client-Test Drivers with whom the Prancing Horse will roll out a test programme over the coming two years.

The car’s enormous potential is attested to by two significant figures:  a total power output of 1050 cv (860 cv delivered by its conventional V12 engine and 190 by its electric motor) and maximum torque in excess of 900 Nm.

The FXX K’s 6262 cc V12 features new camshafts and a modified valve train with mechanical rather than hydraulic tappets. The intake manifolds have been redesigned and given a special type of polishing treatment. The exhaust system has been modified as its silencers have been eliminated.

The HY-KERS system has been evolved specifically for pure performance with the result that the driver can control the function logics from the specific 4-setting Manettino on the centre console: Qualify, for maximum performance within a limited number of laps; Long Run to optimise performance consistency; Manual Boost for instant maximum torque delivery; and Fast Charge, for a fast recharge of the car’s battery. 

A focus on delivering maximum efficiency at every stage of every track lap has resulted in extensive but integrated work on the entire car body in terms of both active and passive aerodynamics.  

The front of the car is dominated by a twin-profile spoiler and a larger splitter, which is 30 mm lower, with a gap in its centre. This design is an application of the concepts developed to improve aero balance in the GT category of the WEC, which Ferrari has won for three consecutive years.  

Two pairs of vertical elements, an endplate and, externally, a dive plane, together with vertical fins channel the air towards the car’s flanks, generating a longitudinal vortex that creates a localised depression. This in turn sucks the wake from the wheels to the outside of the aerodynamic underbody. Along with the side skirts that extend out from the sills, the vortex helps isolate the airflow from the underbody to boost its efficiency.

The solutions on the rear of the car are highly sophisticated, too. The tail section is now higher and the mobile spoiler extends further for a total increase in extension of 60mm when fully deployed. A vertical fin and a small wing each side of the tail act as guide vanes in the low drag configuration and boost the spoiler’s efficiency in the high downforce one. 

This system also creates considerable downforce at the rear of the car, allowing the use of an extreme diffusion volume for the rear diffuser which optimises air extraction from the underbody.  The section of the flat underbody just ahead of the rear wheels is also exploited to the full to generate downforce thanks to the reduced pressure in the wheel arch guaranteed by the direct connection to the rear of the car by a by-pass duct.

The result is a 50% improvement in downforce in the low drag configuration and a 30% improvement in the more aggressive downforce configuration, resulting in a figure of 540 kg at 200 km/h.

Vehicle dynamics are further improved by the adoption of Pirelli slicks complete with sensors that monitor longitudinal, lateral and radial acceleration, as well as temperature and pressure. This ensures an accurate analysis of the interaction between the tyre and track surface, providing even more vital data to enable the traction control system to guarantee maximum performance.

The intervention level of the E-Diff electronic differential, F1-Trac traction control, Racing SSC (Side Slip Angle Control) - now specially calibrated to suit the car’s slick tyres - and the high-performance ABS can be controlled using the five-position Manettino on the steering wheel.