Ferrari California

Foldin' opportunity

I'm genuinely worried and more than a little apprehensive. If you believe Maranello's hype, the new California is a Ferrari with mass-market appeal. The risk, however, is that by broadening the versatility, making a car that is notably less demanding to drive, easier to get in and out of, roomier and less expensive to run, a car whose target market includes a four-fold increase in the percentage of female buyers, the engineers may have endangered the very thing that has made Ferraris so special for over 60 years.

I already know that the pale-blue 1735kg California I'm about to sample for the first time is 45kg heavier than the far more powerful 599 and a massive 275kg over an F430 coupe. It has a push-button hardtop roof, usually an instant warning that the car is intended for Californian boulevards - surely one reason for a name without the traditional number - and Shanghai freeways, not the flowing mountain roads and race tracks that should be any Ferrari's natural home. The bloody thing even has an electronic parking brake, power operation for steering wheel adjustment and lists cruise control as an option. Mind you, they stopped short of cupholders.

Nor is the California a thing of great beauty. The styling is fussy. The awkward crease going up the door contrived. Pininfarina has discovered just how tricky it is to package a folding metal roof without upsetting the proportions. It is no surprise, yet still disappointing, to find that the rear end is bulky to the point of being bulbous and overly tall. It's especially graceless from rear three-quarters with the roof down. That's the price, it seems, of combining a proper boot with the ingenuity of such a roof. Let's be kind and say that aesthetically, the California is challenged.

The economic squeeze will surely have a growing impact, but as of now Ferrari says it already has firm deposits on two year's production - meaning 5000 cars globally and 170 in Australia - and claims that 70 percent of the buyers will be new to the marque. It's targeting top-end AMG Mercedes SLs, the Bentley Continental GTC and Aston Martin DB9 Volante.

Knowing none of these are hardcore driver's cars, you can understand my anxiety. It is such a complete departure from anything Ferrari has done before that I'm even wondering if the new car deserves to wear the prancing horse at all?

It does. All you need are five minutes at the wheel on the right road.

Open the big aluminium door, snuggle down inside the fragrant leather-lined cabin and the design of the dashboard and interior layout mostly looks and feels familiar (except for the touch-screen monitor and controls that seem to come from a Subaru), but it's a class above the F430 in quality and comfort.

The California features what Ferrari calls '2 plus' seating. Depending on the country into which it's sold, the Cali is offered with a choice of either two tiny, smaller-than-911-sized rear buckets or a small bench, with a fold-down rear seat-back. Cars destined for Australia only get the bench because the buckets don't meet Australia's unique child-seat requirements. A removable wind deflector screen can be snapped into place over the rear seats to reduce buffeting.

Press the starter button on the steering wheel and the V8 barks, though, worryingly, the new twin-clutch Getrag seven-speed gearbox defaults to automatic. We slide out of the car park, no hesitation, no jerky take-off. The new 7DCL750 (destined for every future volume production Ferrari) is even more fluent than the superb new BMW M3 M DCT gearbox and in my experience the best of this new breed of gearboxes. Next year, apparently, the Getrag is joined by a conventional manual six-speeder, mounted immediately behind the engine, but understandably less than 10 percent of customers are expected to tick the box to request the extra-cost manual option. I wouldn't bother.

Try auto, in Comfort mode, and the shifts are indiscernible; heard, not felt, even as it automatically upshifts at 7500rpm. At the other end of the scale, you can drop it into seventh gear at 75km/h and the engine will still pull smoothly, happily. Boot the throttle in auto and it instantaneously and seamlessly down-changes three ratios. Courtesy of a new multi-link rear suspension that offers five times the longitudinal compliance of the long-established double wishbones, there is a suppleness, almost softness of rebound control to the ride that no Ferrari has ever achieved, while the steering is light and quick with just 2.5 turns lock-to-lock. Truly, nobody new to Ferrari is going to be intimidated by the California in this configuration.

Flip to manual mode and select our preferred Sport setting (on the three-stage manettino on the steering wheel) and the car takes on another personality: firmer, harder, red-blooded. The transmission holds gears until the driver decides a shift is required, the dampers firm up, and there's more leeway from the stability and traction control systems. Flick through the incredibly tightly stacked first, second, third and fourth ratios and only a loud menacing crack betrays the gear change, the engine sound quickly rising to a rasping howl, the flat-plane crankshaft ensuring it sounds more like a howling hi-po four than a melodious V8.

Despite an inferior power-to-weight ratio, Ferrari says the California is quicker to 100km/h than an F430. The 'less than 4sec to 100km/h' is largely credited to the brilliant launch-control software that moderates wheelspin by momentarily slipping the clutch between 3000-4000rpm before the rear tyres really bite. Once you're above 4000rpm, the performance is electrifying; the gearchange instantaneous. The reworked engine revs all the way to the 8250rpm cut-out, howling ever more urgently until you snap the right-hand paddle back and another gear is delivered without any perceptible pause. In every situation this is a magnificent gearshift. Only one disappointment: there is no auto throttle blip on the downshift.

That V8 may be front-mounted, but it's fitted tight against the front bulkhead, behind the front axle line, so the California is technically a mid-engine car with a delicious 47/53 weight distribution. Race up and down those incredibly slippery Sicilian mountain roads and the steering is beautifully linear with just enough self-centring and the right dose of consistent weighting when you hold the car in oversteer; those big carbon-ceramic discs strong and eager, progressive and quiet. Apply power in the tight corners, feed in the opposite lock, holding the Ferrari in a powerslide for the camera, and you discover there's latitude to dial in even more grunt and slingshot out and to the next apex. Turn off the CST electronic nanny and you're on your own; all electronic controls apart from the ABS system are eliminated. It's more predictable than an F430, if lacking the same level of body control, yet capable of playing proper supercar and road racer. On these greasy roads grip from the Bridgestone tyres - 245/40ZR19 up front and 285/40ZR19 in the rear - is hard to measure, but I doubt it is anything other than prodigious on any normal dry surface.

Thanks to the stiff alloy-spaceframe construction (and too-thick A-pillars that hamper visibility), I could not detect any scuttle shake. Roof up, refinement is at least as good as any rival. Rear visibility is lousy, but the car does look better with its hardtop in place.

This is the most forgiving, best-balanced car Ferrari makes, and it can play stylish shopping convertible as well as any of its easy-driving rivals. Yet the flip side is that the California can also be hard-edged; a true sports car that, while clearly not designed for the race track - Ferrari says there won't be a Scuderia or Challenge version - still has a breadth of ability that makes this one of the great sporting GT cars.

The California does indeed take Ferrari on a very different tack, abandoning its heartland and going after a more mainstream audience. But I needn't have worried. In trading purity for popularism, the men from Maranello have produced a marvellous driving, if not beautiful, car that complements the virtually identically priced F430.