Classic Car: Enzo Ferrari

Ferrari had a goal in mind when developing the Enzo. Besides paying homage to their founder, they wanted to build a car to dethrone the best super car of the time, the McLaren F1. Powering the Enzo is Ferrari’s F140 6.0L V12 engine putting out 651 hp and 485 lb-ft of torque. It’s monstrous. Once you hit the red start button on the center console the engine note is reminiscent of a Formula 1 racer. Putting the power to the wheels is Ferrari’s F1 gearbox—a semi-automatic six speed transmission that uses paddles on the steering wheel to change gears in just 150 milliseconds.

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DESIGN: Billed as a road legal race car, the designers took great pains to make sure that two things were achieved: great aerodynamics and low weight . To achieve the latter, they built the entire body out of carbon fiber. If that sounds expensive to you, well, it is. The sticker price of an Enzo back in 2003 was north of $600,000. The weight savings continued on the interior as well. There are no carpets, no sound proofing, not even any power windows. All in the name of weight savings. Its aerodynamics were a slightly different story. While not as slippery as most super cars, it did best them in downforce. Downforce is the amount of pressure keep the car on the road—the more of it you have, the better. The Enzo was able to produce 775kg of downforce thanks to Ferrari’s Formula 1 background. Basically, if it went fast enough, it could drive on the ceiling.

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