CarBrandLogos archive · Ferrari · 2013

FerrariLaFerrari

A Formula One energy recovery system, bolted to the loudest V12 Maranello could build.

Photo: Axion23 · CC BY 2.0

The story

A defining chapter in Ferrari history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Ferrari LaFerrari, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

Geneva Motor Show 2013 - Ferrari La Ferrari rear wheel

Origins

By 2013 the flagship supercar had become an argument about hybrid systems. McLaren and Porsche were both preparing petrol-electric machines, and Ferrari's answer refused the obvious framing: the electric motor was not there to save fuel. Named HY-KERS after the energy recovery systems then used in Formula One, it existed to fill the torque gaps of a naturally aspirated engine and to add power on top of it.

Geneva Motor Show 2013 - Ferrari La Ferrari rear wheel · Clément Bucco-Lechat · CC BY-SA 3.0

Geneva Motor Show 2013 - Ferrari La Ferrari engine

Design and engineering

The engine was a 6.3-litre development of the F140 V12, the largest and most powerful naturally aspirated engine Ferrari had put in a road car, mounted behind the driver and driving the rear wheels through a seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox. The electric motor worked through the same transmission, so there was no separate electric axle and no pure-electric driving mode of any consequence — this was a hybrid built for a lap time.

Geneva Motor Show 2013 - Ferrari La Ferrari engine · Clément Bucco-Lechat · CC BY-SA 3.0

In production

Flavio Manzoni's styling centre handled the body, and it was the first Ferrari flagship designed in-house rather than at Pininfarina, a break with more than fifty years of practice. The chassis was carbon fibre laid up in the same facility that builds Ferrari's racing tubs, and the driver's seat was fixed to it, with the pedals moving instead.

Ferrari La Ferrari rear · TTTNIS · CC0

Legacy

Sales were by invitation only, and Ferrari deliberately built fewer cars than it had confirmed buyers. An open Aperta version followed and ran to 2018. LaFerrari succeeded the Enzo and was replaced by the F80, which took the hybrid logic further with a turbocharged V6. It stands as the last Ferrari flagship to use a large naturally aspirated V12, which is most of why it is valued as it is.

At a glance