2010 Lamborghini LP550-2 Valentino Balboni

As a back-to-the-future model, the LP550-2 not only lists no technical breakthroughs, it actually goes backwards.

For starters, Lambo ripped a lot of weight out of the LP560-4’s front diff compared to the original Gallardo, but the Balboni car does away with it, and the centre diff, completely.

Not just that, but it has less power, too. That’s only a minor software tweak, though, because the only mechanical difference through the powertrain (apart from the amputated diffs) is a new exhaust.

Though the LP550-2 Balboni doesn’t take Lamborghini in a new styling direction, it does modify the existing goods a bit. Shy people don’t go near Lamborghini showrooms with checkbooks, but you’ll need an astonishingly high tolerance for attention to fork out for a Balboni edition car, even if there’s only 250 of them worldwide.

For starters, the colours are, well, bright. Bright yellow, bright green, just plain bright. Then, in case anybody missed it, there’s a long white stripe down the middle, then another offset stripe down one side of that.

Visually, it’s a trifle loud, perhaps.

It’s a bit the same inside, with the two sharpest color contrasts they could find in the leather shop slapped together to make a lighter, brighter interior, all the way from the seats to the dashboard.

And then there’s Balboni’s signature, machined into a piece of alloy that you see every time you approach the door handle.

It still has satellite navigation, it still has the Audi-sourced multi-media system and screen and it still feels like a luxurious, comfortable place from which to launch attacks.

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