This Ferrari is fancy enough that the higher-ups of Kelley Blue Book have asked
me to dress up to review it. So, while I do that,
enjoy the voiceover. Let's see, the GTC4Lusso is a speedy, ultra luxe, grand
touring car that picks up where the Ferrari FF left off.
Its two-door shooting-brake body style houses four seats and presumably room
for their occupant's stuff. Assuming I look presentable
let's go prance this horse around California's fake Italian coastline.
Mmmm Palos Verdes, coastal, affluent, sunny, this will do just fine.
Okay let's talk Lusso. The original clumsily-titled GTC4Lusso rocks
a 681 horsepower naturally aspirated 6.3-liter V12, a 7-speed dual-clutch
transmission, all-wheel steering, and a clever lightweight two-speed gearbox
with torque vectoring abilities to direct power to the appropriate front tire.
According to Ferrari, the V12 Lusso springs
from static to 62 miles per hour in 3.4 seconds, onward to a 208-mile per hour
top speed. Fun! This however is the GTC4Lusso T.
That T indicates the presence of a 3.9-liter turbocharged flat-plane V8. In to the
back of those cars! Just kidding. With an 80 horsepower deficit and no fancy
all-wheel-drive like the regular Lusso, you might be tempted to pity the T, but
as any child of the 80s will tell you, Mr. T pities you. With that strained
wordplay out of the way, let's see how the GTC4Lusso T fares as a grand
tourer. To help me do that I'm going to recruit my car reviewer friend Lyn. Hey,
Lyn, do you want to drive a Ferrari Lusso GTC4 while I review the backseat? Uh, is
the Pope Catholic Micah? Yeah. Bye So, Micah, I happen to know a great fake
Italian road on which we can tour. What do you say we tour?
Let's grand tour it. Fantastic. Even though the Lusso GTC is a grand
touring car it has a top speed of 199-miles an hour, which means it's fast.
The visibility, I'm not going to say is phenomenal, but it's a Ferrari, they
don't like you looking in the back. That's why they usually put the engine
back there. That's right. To be clear, the we know the engine is in
the front attentive YouTube commenters. I will say that the roof is amazing. I'm
enjoying it. I like it, first thing it doesn't make you feel like you're
actually in the fishbowl that you're in, but it's marvelous. Would you like
to know how it is here in the backseat? I can report that from the backseat there
is excellent headroom. Legroom is great too, but then Lyn has the seat in the Lyn
position, which is way up there. I can verify that sitting behind myself, my
legs would be very cramped. It's kind of like if you get on Space Mountain and
how your lower section can't move, but you're totally ok with that because it's
right for the context. All that said, can I move up to the front seat please?
That one, yeah? Never!
The Magnaride SCM electronic dampers aren't exactly soft, but there is a bumpy
road suspension setting which makes things a little bit more comfortable. You
know even in sport mode, Ferrari didn't tune the Lusso like a track car, and
while you can feel the road underneath you, it's not violent and no one's gonna
need to go to the chiropractor after a drive. Whatever your aesthetic thoughts
the Lusso's hatchback profile is a boon for cargo space as are folding rear
seats, helping make this the most practical of Ferraris. Elsewhere, the
Lusso's cabin exudes decadent authenticity with stitched leather
everything and real metal elements including a passenger footrest, this
armrest hinge, and a nifty flippable cup holder. There's also a personal spec
plate located inside the rear hatch reminding you that this is not just a
Ferrari but rather your Ferrari. And like all Ferraris, from the driver's seat
there's not a stalk in sight. All essential controls have been squeezed
onto the steering wheel, including the starter, Manettino drive mode selector,
wiper controls, and separate left and right turn signals. The Ferrari Lusso
isn't the first car to sport a dual cockpit design, but it takes that concept
further than most by adding a little screen to help keep the front passenger
engaged. Honestly, I'm not sure how valuable it is to access media and
navigation functions here instead of right here, but I can watch the
performance and VDA information, which is really convenient for keeping tabs on
Lyn while she drives, because my name is on the loan, Lyn. So, I have a right seat
driver now instead of a backseat driver? Yes, yes you do.
Now that I'm thankfully in the driver's seat, I will point out that the
dual-clutch 7-speed transmission is as rapid with the shifts as you would hope.
Oh, that is nice. Up shift, up shift, and yet, when you have it in auto mode and
you're just humming right along, utterly smooth.
Wait a second, you said thankfully in the driver's seat. What does that say about
my driving? Hey look, a dam! Oh good, a really tight corner. This is a great
opportunity to try out the four-wheel steering. Let's see if it feels agile. The
great thing about the four-wheel steering system is that it gives a
theoretically short wheelbase in tight corners and then on the freeway the rear
wheels turn in the same direction as the front's so you get these really stable
lane changes. I think the system works pretty darn well. Hey Lyn, would you like
to see how launch control works? Yes, I would. PS button, ESC off, left foot on brake right
foot planted, left foot off! Ahhhhhh, up shift! Huh, pretty quick.
Yeah, the V8 is just fine right? You're not saying like ah I wish there's a V12
powering this thing. No, no. What about the sound? I think the sound is actually pretty
decent for a V8. Better than the 12? No, nothing's better than the 12. I can't top
that opinion. That's the correct opinion. One more quick note about the
transmission, when you're cruising along when you floor it
sometimes it takes a little while for the transmission to make the right
downshift and for boost to engage, which is not how boost works, but the power to
come on and get that accelerative force, so pro tip, if you'd like to go fast and
you know it's coming up soon downshift in advance. That worked pretty well.
There's a lot to like about the Lusso, but we should discuss price. Including
a gas guzzler tax and destination charges, a base Ferrari GTC4Lusso T
costs almost $270,000. As tested $333,080.
That nearly $60,000 price
jump comes via a panoramic roof, a front camera system, 128 gigabytes of
infotainment storage, and Apple CarPlay, a normally free feature that cost a cool
$4,219.
No, I did not misspeak. Put another way, the GTC4Lusso is objectively
expensive, but Ferrari buyers objectively do not care.
So, which Lusso should you buy? Well the V12 cost about $40,000
more than the V8, but that fee brings with it the oral and accelerative
delights of a v12 along with all-wheel-drive, making it the right car
for Ferrari buyers who drive in the snow. If you're the kind of Ferrari driver who
actually drives in the snow, please send me a picture on Instagram. Wait, I want a
graphic too.
That's actually pretty nice graphic. Snow-loving V12 fanatics know which Lusso to
buy, but for more grounded Ferrari shoppers, the GTC4Lusso T could be
the superior choice, merging rear-drive agility and a powerhouse V8 with
sultan-worthy trappings inside and out, the Lusso T is a truly excellent grand
touring machine. As a bonus, the T's lower base price frees up funds for the option
sheet. If I wanted a Ferrari to escape my wife and child, it would be the 488 GTB,
but if I wanted to bring them with me the GTC4Lusso is the Ferrari I
would buy. Lyn what do you think? It's an absolute looker. It's exciting to drive,
because, well, it is a Ferrari, and it's a wagon, which means the Lusso GTC4 is
the tiniest slice on the Venn diagram that intersects excess and practicality.
So, will you take a personal check for it? Yeah, I think that's the end of the
video. Can I have the keys back? Okay. Thank you. Do you want a ride? Yeah.
Everything's back to normal it's like the end of a sitcom where all the crazy
stuff is now reset.