488 Pista on the Nürburgring: Onboard Video and Feedback

Hey guys, I've been pretty disappointed in myself that I've not been able to write up more about my experience with the pista so far as Ive just been too busy. These are not all of my thoughts but a quick overview.. I will go into much more detail later on.

My first impressions of the Pista were that it was the most beautiful car that I own and that still stands.. I use my cars primarily on the Nürburgring so looks are nice but the driving characteristic is the most important.

I will just say that if you have one coming and you're going to use it on track chances are good that you're going to love it. The car is brutally fast in a straight line and the traction that the car has is one of the best I have driven. You need to turn dsc off to get out of the apex to full potential but once you do that the thing is a rocket. You can see in the video below how it picks up speed. It is quicker from turn to turn than the 720s is and it picks up speeds above 230kmh much much faster. The midrange power and torque pins you in your seat each time you get on the gas and or switch gears.

The transmission (programming) in the 488 was a big reason I sold mine, I really disliked it... the Pista is different, the pause where your head slams forward during the paust between gear changes has been eliminated and it feels as if its been replaced with the slipping of the clutches when engaging the next gear. The result is an immediate change that magnifies the torque of the engine when upshifting. It is a wonderful thing rowing through the gears of the Pista.

Often such as in the video below, we are not giving 100% to performance and are out enjoying the car. In this case the characteristics of the drivetrain are perfect. Push the car to 80-90% and it excites you to no end. Did I mention the grip? The car simple rockets forward and that is so cool.

For the bad.. This is where some may not love it... I still am not that fond of the seating position vs what McLaren are doing, for taller people you will not get a helmet on in this car. Another note is that the DSC is a bit intrusive if you run with it in Race Mode. This issue is mainly while the steering wheel is not straight and you want to apply power. This forces you to turn things off right away. Finally the suspension is a bit soft, the car comes from the factory with quite a bit of ride height, especially in the front and you should not drop it down much as there is a lot of roll and the car squats down heavily in compressions. There are about 4 places on the Nordschleife where I scrape the lip during compressions. When driving the body roll does not kill you that much however you can get into a bit of understeer and I think a little stiffer roll control would help this considerably. The 600LT for example with 225-19 tires on the front has a bit more responsive front end and similar aero.. but a much stiffer suspension and roll control.

In all the car is very fast, very capable and is a step up vs the speciale hands down in terms of performance. What I can say about the speciale is that it was more playful, loose and a nicer soundtrack. The motor in the Pista is a weapon and to be honest I would take it over the 9k RPM NA motor.. it is that good of an engine.

The aero on the Pista feels more impressive than the 720s which is saying a lot. The cool thing is that even though we are dealing with nice levels of down force, it still has very strong top end acceleration numbers. The Aero on the Speciale was nearly non existent by comparison and the acceleration, while being quick was nothing to really comment about.

That is a quick overview and I promise to get more into it when I have some time. Until then here is a little video cruising on the Nürburgring. The car has so much potential, I really am taking it easy in this video due to the amount of traffic and cars holding me up. Its alway important to exercise patience on days like that!!

 

a couple photos as well

no doubt in my mind that it will go sub 7 on stock tires. Next time you come be sure to look me up and ill make sure to show you around a bit

 

The GT3 was moving along decently but there are a few things to consider. Notice at the beginning of the lap he was no where to be found and I caught him mid lap with a large difference in pace. Once I reached him, I slowed down considerably, you can see that my corner speeds reduced quite a bit and I was accelerating out of the corners a lot slower w him in front. For example the pace slows a lot at 2:50. I will take a small segment and say what would normally be full throttle but in this lap I am coasting behind the Gt3

In the following segments I am off the throttle where you could and should be full..

2:56 to 3:00
3:10-3:14
3:25-3:29
3:45-3:52

With those slower acceleration points you then have less aggressive braking points and ultimately less load on the front end and your corner speeds slow down.
These lift of segments spread out over 3 or so minutes of the lap add up to a ton of time lost. This however is ok as the beauty of public driving on the Nordschleife is to enjoy the drive and sometimes its more fun to follow someone for a bit than just fly through traffic (which is also rewarding).

The other HUGE part of driving on the Nordschleife is safety, you will see that coming to Lauda Links at 3:48 I could have easily passed him. However as I go next to him I saw slow the traffic on the right, knowing that I had better braking capability I slowed down to let him back over and make sure he did not have an oh **** moment. It was clear that if I continued the pass, he was going to have stay to the right after the turn which is not as grippy and he would have to slam on the brakes to avoid the traffic that he would have inevitably been right behind at 3:52 under braking had I passed.. So instead I slowed down and let him get back to the left so that he could have good track to brake in and be on the line before the right hander.

When you have thousands of laps on the ring you do learn some things and ultimately start looking out for the other cars and make sure you can help keep them out of issues as well. The next thing you start to do is read the traffic and make adjustments for things happening far ahead. around 4:20 we are at a section of track that the Pista can hit 270mkh without issue and here in this video I am cruising along at 200 w steady throttle. This is because way in the distance I can see 3 cars that we will reach 15 seconds later. The Porsche will converge w the Mercedes at a tricky left hand curve. You can see at about 4:35 the Porsche reaches the Mercedes and is hard on the brakes. On the other hand I laid back and am I am now only downshifting as I catch them. I saw the scenario unfolding 15 seconds prior to it happening so I was able to lay back and lost no time at all while they sorted each other out and the Porsche worked out how he was getting around the Mercedes. I was then in position to pass the Mercedes on the inside as he was always going to push to the right due to his line entering the turn.

So in short, the Porsche had a good lap and I lost probably 20 seconds or more over that couple minutes following him. It didn't bother me as Im not out chasing lap times rather just enjoying the drive. If I was being aggressive I could have passed him at 2:58 and been on with my lap. Instead I decided to go for a nice cruise and enjoy the cars. I get more pleasure out of a nice smooth and clean lap vs an aggressive over the top lap.

I really see driving in traffic as an art, you time your straight line acceleration and braking points to meet the slow traffic at ideal points. Go to the video at 2:05 and see the pass at 2:17, the meeting point of our two cars was not just chance that I passed him on the inside there. I tried to set up the pass as smooth as possible by judging our two speeds and attempting to meet while he was to the right for his left hander into Adenauer Forst.

Thank you, I love what we do at Apex... sharing the ring with so many really is a treat.

I think the GT3 driver was happy to have some fun and glad I wasn't all up his bumper and let him do his thing! I doubt anyone in that lap had any stress! Was a pleasure getting to run the Pista Sunday.. had a fantastic time w the car!