Show-stopping new production cars and concepts were not lacking in Geneva this year. There were so many, in fact, that we struggled to take it all in. Yet while Ferrari didn't have any new models to show us, somehow we couldn't help but slow down in front of its booth as we rushed from press conference to press conference. Maybe it was the classic Daytona sitting next to the 612 Scaglietti bathed in soft light, or maybe the pair of lookers standing next to them. Guess we'll never know, but you can feast your eyes on all the sexy models in the gallery below.
What Ferrari did unveil at the Swiss show, however, was a new customization program. Called One-to-One, the program takes the catalog of options under the existing Carrozzeria Scaglietti Programme a step further. A customization studio is being built at the factory in Maranello where clients can hand-pick a wide variety of options from leather swatches to brake calipers and everything in between. The program is being launched on the 612 Scaglietti, but will assuredly be broadened to the entire range in due course. For the 612, Ferrari also announced the availability of the SuperFast robotic gearbox and a new electrochromatic glass roof that can tint and lighten at the push of a button like the folding hardtop on the limited edition Superamerica.
When I was a kid, I started collecting model Ferraris. Guests would ask if I built them myself, but I never had the patience – or time – to invest in anything more complicated than taking a die-cast out of its box. This, however, is unfathomable: a full scale replica of the Ferrari F2008 made out of chocolate.
The delicious racing car was built for a Ferrari owners club in Naples, Italy, by Club Pasticceri Italiani. The effort took over a year to complete: the confectioners started melting the chocolate in 2007, and then built a smaller scale model before beginning construction of the full-size version. It took 4,405lbs of Belgian chocolate and over $23,000 to make it. The end result was bigger, more impressive and more colorful than McLaren's chocolate racer, and undoubtedly much tastier than the F1 car made from matchsticks. Tragically and deliciously, however, the chocolate racer was set to be smashed to pieces and eaten by the members of the Ferrari club this past weekend.
Despite being more than three weeks away from the first Formula 1 race of the 2008 season, Jarno Trulli has already predicted that Ferrari will win the 2008 championship. After testing in the Toyota alongside Ferrari in Bahrain, Trulli declared that "the championship already looks over to me before it has started." The F2008 was noticeably quicker than the competition, posting lap times half a second quicker than even McLaren. Meanwhile, Trulli seemed depressed about the Toyota TF108, saying that it was "unrealistic to talk about podiums."
