Comprehensive update to SF90 hybrid hypercar results in 1036bhp revival of a famous old name
As the Amalfi recently was to the Roma, so the Ferrari 849 Testarossa is to the SF90 Stradale.Ferrari won’t say it gives cars facelifts (it’s not the only car maker to do this), but the 849 is a striking reworking of the plug-in hybrid SF90, which it supersedes in the Ferrari line-up as the topmost performance model in the regular range. Only limited-volume models – most recently the F80 – sit above it.Of late, the existence of the SF90 has had a positive effect on Ferrari’s front-engined V12 coupé, the 12Cilindri, which hasn’t needed to be the range’s performance benchmark and has relaxed (a little – these things are relative) into a fine, comfortable, super-GT. Yet on its own merit the SF90 wasn’t entirely satisfying. It was fast, yes, because with near-enough 1000bhp and four-wheel drive from a V8 supplemented by three electric motors it couldn’t be anything else, but it wasn’t engaging enough as a driver’s car to satisfy the benchmark role Ferrari wanted to give it. It felt like something of a technical exercise, created so Ferrari could prove it could make a series-production PHEV hypercar work – something the 296 GTB better realised. So to dub the 849 Testarossa just a facelift might indeed be harsh. It’s meant to be a significant course correction for this model, to turn a QR code on a table into a handwritten menu. And as we will see, it delivers.
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