From darkness into light

A large V12 engine and a very hefty price. Yet Andrew Frankel is astonished to find a Lamborghini that's more than a display item

- Andrew Frankel

As a child, Lamborghini was the evil empire. I was a Ferrari man and the only explanation I could find to explain why Boxers and Testarossae always lost comparison tests involving the Lamborghini Countach was that those who wrote them were quite clearly wrong.

Then, years later, I started driving them myself and found little reason to change my mind. The Diablo VT - the first all-wheel-drive Lambo if you omit the mad LM002 - would have been a terrible disappointment were I not already expecting it to be precisely that. I then drove a Countach for some historic story and it was even worse: slow and impractical.

But then I drove a Diablo SV - a lighter, cheaper, rear-drive car and loved it. So too the part-carbon SE3O. Then came the Murciélago and every one of those was a joy, which was followed by the Aventador which really was a disappointment because looking that good, following the Murciélago and having a carbon tub, by now I was expecting it to be brilliant. Which it really, really wasn't, until I drove the final SVJ version which unquestionably was.

And if I wasn’t completely flummoxed by then, Max Girardo recently leant me a Countach just like the one I’d hated and it was fabulous, for which the only explanation I can find is that the first one must have been worn out. So the point is you never really know what you’re going to get with these big Lambos.