Levy: The experience behind the wheel is phenomenal. You’re right—once the fluids and materials get up to temperature the cabin is an olfactory delight. My only gripe is, if like me you are familiar with Audi products, the center dash with HVAC and nav straight out of my wife’s Q7, while perfectly suited for a $60k SUV is a little downmarket for a mega-buck supercar. Likewise, the R8 instrument cluster with Italian graphics. But I guess I’ll take the German stuff that works over Italian electronics that at some point won’t. Unlike its scissor-doored forefathers and siblings, ingress and egress is no harder than a Porsche Carrera. Similarly the view back and side holds no surprises, though judging the front corners while parking and in traffic takes some practice. Other than that, the seats are the best I’ve ever sat on, and the (real) suede-rimmed steering wheel is a joy to hold. I loved the delicate spoon like paddles, and, yes in full auto the E-Gear is moderately annoying, though switched to Sport and driven like a manual without a clutch is perfect. Up-changes fire off like an Heckler & Koch nine millimeter and down shifts are accompanied with a perfectly timed and perfect sounding bellow from the V10. Drop into first from second at 30mph and you’d swear someone set off an IED — pedestrians run for cover! Suspension isn’t quite rattle your fillings stiff over Hollywood’s pot holes, the Lambo is actually slightly more supple than the kidney-beating Nissan GT-R — just slightly, but its clear that the calibrations are for progress above that of Sunset Boulevard stop and go. It’s a shame that’s where so many Gallardos spend so much time. Fortunately ours got to run in the wild some….

Lieberman: Did it ever. We decided that our lack of skills and the Gallardo LP560-4’s massive ability would be too much for our usual route of Little Tujunga. So we took it up Big Tujunga Canyon, Angeles Forest Highway and through Bouquet Canyon instead. Whoa, Nelly! To be honest, I’ve never before had the opportunity to take such a mighty car out in a non-controlled environment. A Viper on a coned course is one thing, but a Gallardo in the wild is quite another. The limits of this Italian are massive. Unlike some our Fiendish favorites–think EVO X and Mazda RX-8 R3 where you push ‘em as hard as you can to quickly play at the limit–the LP560-4 requires a more cautious approach. And for the first hour or so of our canyon run, that’s precisely the way we went about things. Sure, we pushed the car pretty hard, but nowhere near hard enough to get the full flavor. But by the second hour my confidence was up and I began pressing Corsa (the more hardcore transmission setting) and turning the ESP off. I still didn’t do anything too crazy, but for a straight here and a bend there, I gave in to temptation. Guess what? The Lambo was utterly brilliant. And why not? Mid-engine, 552 horsepower, AWD, racey suspension and that damn tranny — plus some of the most challenging roads anywhere — are the parts you need to have the drive of your year, if not decade. Right?

Levy: Except for the whiplash you gave me dipping into the brakes too hard. For real! The fantastic thing about the Gallardo is the way it feels ready to dance at any time. Like a prize fighter up on his toes waiting for the bell, ready to bob and weave, fists up to throw a left hook or block a punch with a nanosecond’s notice — but not in a spooky or twitchy way. Squeeze into the throttle, unleash that demonic howl, lean on the suede wheel and have at it. Acceleration is instant, endless and rock hard. The long throw throttle is like a rheostat that lets you release the naturally aspirated horses one by one — try that with turbos! It was funny when a few miles into Big Tujunga you looked over at me and asked if I was going to start getting into it. I asked you how fast you thought I’d just gone into the last turn. “Sixty?” you replied. “No. I was doing ninety and I’m not going any faster here!” The Gallardo resets the bar. The Gallardo is too capable to take anywhere near its limits on a public road. Going into blind turns at 90 mph is just plain irresponsible. Things go wrong in a big way at those speeds. I don’t care who you are and how good the car is! But that doesn’t mean the experience is dumbed down. Far from it. Even at four tenths you’re involved. The Gallardo wants you to play and keeps you in the game. While the suspension is stiff in traffic, at speed its supple and perfectly damped — you feel everything but you need to. Steering is formula car instant but with perfect weight. While it won’t telegraph every piece of gravel on the road like a Porsche GT3, you know you’re on gravel. The ceramic brakes are grabby and unpredictable in stop-go traffic, and take some real time to get used to, but when you’re scrubbing a hundred of the hundred and thirty miles an hour you’re carrying into a left hander, pefect for the job. Man, I love this car!

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