PCFormat Forum Archive

Few things are worse than putting your car into the weeds at speed. One of them is an impromptu farming expedition in a multi-million dollar SUV concept built atop a Lamborghini Gallardo.

At this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed, two cars met an untimely demise while running up the winding hill that serves as the event’s center stage. The first was a historic Porsche 962C endurance racer that battled at Le Mans in the late 1980s and early ’90s. Despite mixing it up with Ferraris and Porsches in the past, it got stuffed into a wall at the end of the starting straight. But more painful was the punting of one priceless Parcour.

Italdesign Giugiaro rolled out two Lamborghini-based concepts at the Geneva Motor Show this year, and decided that the hardtop version — with its 550-horsepower, mid-mounted V10 — should run up the hill. Bad move.

Halfway up the Earl of March’s narrow, circuitous driveway, the man at the helm lost control in a high-speed left-hander, spinning the one-off concept into a wall of hay bails.

While the damage didn’t look too bad at initial impact, when the Parcour concept was towed away on a flatbed the extent of the injuries to the left side had the crowd wincing in unison.

If Italdesign Giugiaro and Lamborghini learned anything it’s: A) A Lambo SUV is a bad idea and B) mounting a massive V10 over a foot off the ground has a seriously detrimental effect on handling. Lesson learned.