After 40 years service for the one company the traditional gift at retirement, supposedly, is a gold watch. Lamborghini, though, do things a little bit differently. Valentino Blaboni, the company’s chief test driver for a total of four decades, was presented with his own Gallardo.
Cool, imagine getting a supercar given to you when you retire. Nice, huh. But, Lamborghini actually went one step further by making a special limited edition run of the Gallardo adorned with Balboni’s name. Just 250 have been made—its full title, Lamborghini Gallardo LP 550-2 Valentino Balboni.
Taking the honour further the Italian manufacturer did away with the Gallardo’s all-wheel drive system and decided to send every one of the car’s 550 horsepower to the rear wheels. Now, that is some retirement present!
The above still is taken from a brief YouTube clip produced by Danish car mag Bil Magasinet. You can see that after the jump, along with more images of Balboni and his car.
In the clip Balboni talks of trying to capture the spirit of the Miura and Countach in “his” Gallardo. He seems like a great guy, as well. The video is available in 1080p, so I suggest watching in full screen with the volume turned up to eleven.
[Thanks to Paul for the tip]