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Weekly Recap: Ferrari, Ford and Porsche power up for Geneva

Monday was Groundhog Day. Tuesday, apparently, was Sports Car Day. The Ferrari 488 GTB, the Ford Focus RS and the Porsche Cayman GT4 all debuted within hours of each other ahead of their rollouts at the Geneva Motor Show. Three sporty machines, three vastly different approaches – and a lot of implications for enthusiasts. That's a day worth repeating. It also illustrates the opportunities automakers see in the performance market, which is expected to grow in the coming years. Ford estimates the segment has expanded 14 percent in Europe and surged 70 percent in North America since 2009. The Detroit Auto Show was evidence of this, and performance cars of every stripe debuted, including the Acura NSX, Ford GT, Alfa Romeo 4C Spider and several others. This isn't a fad. Performance cars aren't going away. The question is why? Stricter CAFE standards are looming in the United States, as are tighter emissions regulations in Europe. And no one expects gas prices to remain low in America. None of this matters for sports cars, and automakers are increasingly using them to elevate their images. That's why Dodge rolled out two 707-horsepower Hellcats last year. It's why Ford has decided to resurrect the GT for road and track. It's why in the depths of bankruptcy, General Motors continued work on the Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, not to mention the Z06. "Great brands are made one car at a time," Ford of Europe president Jim Farley said at the reveal of the Focus RS. Still, companies make those cars for different reasons. View 5 Photos Mainstream brands like Ford and Dodge want to build cars that get people talking, excite their bases and drive more potential customers into the showroom. They probably don't buy a Focus RS or a Hellcat, but suddenly the regular Focus hatch looks a bit hotter, and that V6 Charger seems to be just a touch more muscular. The halo of performance is alive and well in the eyes of automakers and their customers. "It's one of the most effective catalysts for ingenuity and innovation," said Joe Bakaj, vice president of product development for Ford of Europe. That also leads to a trickle-down effect. Some of the technologies inevitably make their way to other products. It's hard to think the new all-wheel-drive system in the Focus RS that distributes torque front to rear and side to side won't be used in other vehicles. It's different for Ferrari and Porsche.

White Christmas: Miami Vice Ferrari Testarossa on eBay for $1.75M

Were the eighties responsible for more iconic television cars than any other decade? Without even thinking about it we can reel off B.A. Baracus' GMC van, the Knight Industries Two Thousand and General Lee, Hardcastle and McCormick's Coyote, Magnum P.I.'s Ferrari 308. That's before we dip into personal favorites like The Fall Guy's GMC and the Dodge Ram Power Wagon from Simon and Simon, or hop over to cartoons like Transformers, the GoBots and MASK. And then there was this, among the top rung of eighties memorabilia, a 1986 Ferrari Testarossa claimed to be one of two used in Miami Vice. You'll remember that the show began with James "Sonny" Crockett driving a black Daytona Coupe, but it was a replica built on C3 Corvette running gear. The story is that Ferrari sued the replica maker and made the show's producers an offer: blow up the replica on the show in return for two Testarossas to use. And that, it's said, is how Crockett's convertible got hit by a missile during an undercover assignment with an arms dealer. The original cars were Carbon Black, but the show's cameras couldn't keep up with them at night, so director Michael Mann had them painted white. For sale on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $1.75M, the seller says he has the all of the service history paperwork and documentation from Ferrari North America. According to the seller, he bought it about three years ago; before that, it was last sold in 1991 and sat in a Miami garage for years, so it has 16,000 miles on the odometer. The Hagerty Price Guide Report shows Testarossa values have nearly doubled in four years, but a pristine find should still only fetch about $93,500, just to make sure you're clear on the seller's Hollywood premium. Nostalgia awaits you in the gallery, and perhaps a new car at the link. Featured Gallery 1986 Ferrari Testarossa from Miami Vice View 12 Photos News Source: eBay via Car and Driver TV/Movies Ferrari Auctions Coupe Luxury Performance eBay ferrari testarossa

2016 Ferrari 488 GTB First Drive

After The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa, after recording their first album, Iggy and the Stooges released the brilliant Fun House. Not every second creative attempt has to bomb like The Strokes' second, Room On Fire, and not every new car model has to be heavier and uglier like the Mustang II. Or at least that was the hope as I arrived in Italy for the launch of the 2016 Ferrari 488 GTB (Gran Turismo Berlinetta, if you're wondering). The new car traces its lineage back through 40 years of mid-engined V8 supercars, one that started with the 1975 308 GTB that replaced the V6 Dino series. But the 488 is also the follow-up to the 458 Italia, which is generally considered to be the zenith of all things Ferrari. With sublime handling and a yowling V8 that made you question how fast you could really travel on public roads, the Italia was an Italian missile wrapped in voluptuous aluminum. When the 488 GTB debuted at the Geneva Motor Show in March, the portents weren't good. As well as having fewer curves and a turbo engine, trouble was brewing inside the stronghold. Last fall, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) chairmain Sergio Marchionne sacked Ferrari president Luca de Montezemolo. And Marchionne's plan to sell 10 percent of Ferrari on the stock market raises fears of hedge fund guys calling the shots at this archetypal Italian sports car maker. What's more, there's already talk of increasing annual production from the current cap of 7,000 units to 10,000. But back to the 488 GTB. The new car is based on the same aluminum underbody as the 458, but with less dramatic looks. The source of those looks is not the design department, however. "We gave them [the design department] the shape...they started with that shape." explained Matteo Biancalana, Ferrari's aerodynamics chief. So wind tunnel data penned the GTB's lines, mainly because of an ambitious target to achieve 50 percent more downforce than the outgoing model with no increase in aerodynamic drag. "We had to touch every millimetre of the car apart from the carried-over roof," says Biancalana. The front grille channels air through the radiators, cools the brakes and denies air access to the underbody, which consequently develops low pressure areas that suck the car to the road. There's a moveable spoiler under the body at the rear to reduce drag at high speed in a straight line.