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- XSquareStickIt
It's no secret that I am really not a fan of Ferrari, as for over the last five years of me writing for Car of the Week, I haven't sampled a single car from the marque—road or race—that I've found to be even remotely tolerable to drive. The Ferrari 308 GTB '75 however, is perhaps the Ferrari with the best chance of winning me over, simply because it exists within a narrow performance bracket that I enjoy the most: lightweight sports cars that are fast enough to get into trouble, yet aren't so powerful that they dominate the experience and dull the handling. Cars around this performance level sit at around 475–500PP, populated by all–time greats like the 901 Carrera 2.7, E30 M3 SE, S2000, and GR86. A tiny RMR sports car with a songstress of a NA V8 engine, four wheel disc brakes, and a 5–speed stick shift in this category? Sounds absolutely salivating a prospect to me, even if it bears the usual stench of manure that comes with the prancing horse logo.
Of course, being one of the oldest cars in the short list of examples I just gave, the 308 GTB on its bias ply Comfort Medium tyres is by far the most difficult car to drive among that esteemed company, especially when one takes into consideration that, unlike the vast majority of RMR cars, the GTB has a square tyre setup: identically sized 205/70VR14 rubber serve as horseshoes at all four corners. The suspension is much too soft for hard driving, and its brakes do feel a bit wanting even at this modest performance level. To justify its factory–fresh 474.85PP (v1.58 & v1.59) that lets it dance with the aforementioned cars then, the GTB has utterly bonkers straight line acceleration that would let it keep pace with much younger sports cars like the 993 RS CS and E46 M3 as long as the roads don't twist or meander. So far, so expected then: here's a Ferrari that quotes its completely useless dry mass stat and has way too much power for its suspension, brakes, and tyres to handle.
And yet, I'd be lying if I said I didn't have fun racing against my peers on Saturday, even if they for the most part nope–d out of the GTB and into easier and faster machinery. The 308 may be an extremely demanding car to drive, but that's not at all to say that it's unreasonable or unfair. Give it what it asks for—the driver's deepest respect and their undivided attention—and it richly rewards in a deeply engaging, playful drive, one so engrossing that, when I really got into the groove of it during free practice, I had completely forgotten that I had needed to start the race as the lobby host! As barbaric as it is to say, there's a deeply satisfying joy when an extremely difficult car finally clicks in my head, and I sail past my peers fumbling their cars facing the wrong direction on the track. It makes me feel like a kid who has figured out the trick to a puzzle before anybody else, and the cruel inner kid in me will always get smug about that.
Said trick to the puzzle is Countersteering Assist, which I've set to Strong for every tarmac race on Saturday. CSA does dull the initial turn–in of the car quite severely, but the benefit of CSA is that it allows the 308 GTB to drive as I had described in the previous paragraph: like a moody, vindictive, demanding, and sometimes rewarding old Italian classic car that we petrolheads as a whole are so weirdly tolerant of and smitten by. Without CSA, the 308 GTB is COMPLETELY UNDRIVABLE. On corner exits, it behaves as if its dry–sump V8 spits burning oil onto its toilet roll rear tyres the moment there's any lateral g on power; it just snaps instantly without warning or recourse, with roll and yaw movements so severe that the car is simply beyond saving most of the time. The ironic thing about the GTB is that, as noted by Jay, it actually drives really pleasantly on dirt, so much so that I find it perfectly happy on loose surfaces without CSA.
I want to preface what I'm about to write by making clear that this is pure speculation on my part, but this disparity in road and dirt driving brings to my mind a phenomenon brought up by Steve Marvin when he was being interviewed by evo about the Phase 1 Clio V6: lateral force–induced toe out. Upon loading up the rear tyres, the force of the outer rear wheel would bend the suspension and throw off the wheel alignment, resulting in catastrophic instability. Maybe the reason why the GTB was so nice on dirt was because the tyres weren't gripping the road hard enough to really bend the suspension that much. Unfortunately, that snappy oversteer on power seems hard–baked into the car in GT7; I've tried rudimentary fixes such as tinkering with aftermarket suspensions, differentials, and stickier tyres, all to no avail. It NEEDS CSA to simply be a tricky car to drive. Without it, the 308 is just Going To sBinalla, and as such, is a Guaranteed Total Beater, and even someone who detests the brand as much as me finds that just a bit of a pity.
UPDATE 1.59: The latest update seems to have calmed down the 308 quite a fair bit, to the point where CSA is just purely a bane. It still exhibits that weird sudden snapping on power, but it seems to happen much later and somewhat slower now, translating to a half–second faster lap time around Laguna Seca. As it stands in v1.59, the 308 GTB is the first Ferrari I find tolerable... barely.
Of course, being one of the oldest cars in the short list of examples I just gave, the 308 GTB on its bias ply Comfort Medium tyres is by far the most difficult car to drive among that esteemed company, especially when one takes into consideration that, unlike the vast majority of RMR cars, the GTB has a square tyre setup: identically sized 205/70VR14 rubber serve as horseshoes at all four corners. The suspension is much too soft for hard driving, and its brakes do feel a bit wanting even at this modest performance level. To justify its factory–fresh 474.85PP (v1.58 & v1.59) that lets it dance with the aforementioned cars then, the GTB has utterly bonkers straight line acceleration that would let it keep pace with much younger sports cars like the 993 RS CS and E46 M3 as long as the roads don't twist or meander. So far, so expected then: here's a Ferrari that quotes its completely useless dry mass stat and has way too much power for its suspension, brakes, and tyres to handle.
And yet, I'd be lying if I said I didn't have fun racing against my peers on Saturday, even if they for the most part nope–d out of the GTB and into easier and faster machinery. The 308 may be an extremely demanding car to drive, but that's not at all to say that it's unreasonable or unfair. Give it what it asks for—the driver's deepest respect and their undivided attention—and it richly rewards in a deeply engaging, playful drive, one so engrossing that, when I really got into the groove of it during free practice, I had completely forgotten that I had needed to start the race as the lobby host! As barbaric as it is to say, there's a deeply satisfying joy when an extremely difficult car finally clicks in my head, and I sail past my peers fumbling their cars facing the wrong direction on the track. It makes me feel like a kid who has figured out the trick to a puzzle before anybody else, and the cruel inner kid in me will always get smug about that.
Said trick to the puzzle is Countersteering Assist, which I've set to Strong for every tarmac race on Saturday. CSA does dull the initial turn–in of the car quite severely, but the benefit of CSA is that it allows the 308 GTB to drive as I had described in the previous paragraph: like a moody, vindictive, demanding, and sometimes rewarding old Italian classic car that we petrolheads as a whole are so weirdly tolerant of and smitten by. Without CSA, the 308 GTB is COMPLETELY UNDRIVABLE. On corner exits, it behaves as if its dry–sump V8 spits burning oil onto its toilet roll rear tyres the moment there's any lateral g on power; it just snaps instantly without warning or recourse, with roll and yaw movements so severe that the car is simply beyond saving most of the time. The ironic thing about the GTB is that, as noted by Jay, it actually drives really pleasantly on dirt, so much so that I find it perfectly happy on loose surfaces without CSA.
I want to preface what I'm about to write by making clear that this is pure speculation on my part, but this disparity in road and dirt driving brings to my mind a phenomenon brought up by Steve Marvin when he was being interviewed by evo about the Phase 1 Clio V6: lateral force–induced toe out. Upon loading up the rear tyres, the force of the outer rear wheel would bend the suspension and throw off the wheel alignment, resulting in catastrophic instability. Maybe the reason why the GTB was so nice on dirt was because the tyres weren't gripping the road hard enough to really bend the suspension that much. Unfortunately, that snappy oversteer on power seems hard–baked into the car in GT7; I've tried rudimentary fixes such as tinkering with aftermarket suspensions, differentials, and stickier tyres, all to no avail. It NEEDS CSA to simply be a tricky car to drive. Without it, the 308 is just Going To sBinalla, and as such, is a Guaranteed Total Beater, and even someone who detests the brand as much as me finds that just a bit of a pity.
UPDATE 1.59: The latest update seems to have calmed down the 308 quite a fair bit, to the point where CSA is just purely a bane. It still exhibits that weird sudden snapping on power, but it seems to happen much later and somewhat slower now, translating to a half–second faster lap time around Laguna Seca. As it stands in v1.59, the 308 GTB is the first Ferrari I find tolerable... barely.
Thanks for making my day!
