2021 Lamborghini Huracan STO

Lamborghini Gallardo is the most successful model in the history of Lamborghini after having sold more than 14000 units worldwide.

So, to create a successor for the Gallardo is not an easy task and Lamborghini understood this very well. In 2014, Lamborghini unveiled Huracan and announced it as the successor to Lamborghini Gallardo.

However, most automotive journalists were less impressed by the inability of Lamborghini Huracan to excite its driver with the sense of occasion offered by Lamborghini’s of previous era and heavily criticised Lamborghini for playing the “safe game” in designing the Huracan.

Contrary to the comments from various automotive journalists, Lamborghini Huracan quickly started gaining market share as it could farewell with the competition in terms of performance numbers while also providing a safety net via an all-wheel-drive system.

In hunt for more performance while fighting with ever stringent emission rules, even Ferrari started using turbochargers. Following the path of turbocharging, the competition was now pushing 700+hp while emitting less pollution than ever before.

Unfazed by the numbers, Lamborghini diverted their attention towards the wind flowing around the car to improve performance and came up with an active aerodynamic system called as ALA (Aerodinamica Lamborghini Attiva).

This new aerodynamic system was not only 80% lighter than regular sports car’s hydraulics but also provided 750% more downforce compared to standard Lamborghini Huracan. The new model was named as Lamborghini Huracan Performante.

The Lamborghini Huracan Performante was 40 kgs lighter and 30ps more powerful than the standard model, thanks to more carbon fibre parts and revised engine internals.

The clever aerodynamic wizardry, more power and lesser weight enabled the Lamborghini Huracan Performante to lap the notoriously difficult Nürburgring track in just 6minutes 52.01 seconds, which at the time was fastest lap time for a production car by beating the likes of “Million Dollar” hyper cars from Ferrari, Porsche, and McLaren.

With Huracan Performante, Lamborghini quickly gained the admiration of many automotive journalists. Following its success, Lamborghini updated the standard Huracan with Performante’s engine and rear-wheel steering.

This new updated version was named as Lamborghini Huracan Evo. Following its launch, many automotive journalists were really impressed by the capability and character offered by the naturally aspirated engine-which its competitors lacked, but also quick to note the slight lack of speed in straight line compared to its turbo charged competition.

For 2021, Lamborghini have taken the wraps of the Lamborghini Huracan STO (Super Trofeo Omologata) and has presented it as a direct successor to the Lamborghini Huracan Performante.

The Lamborghini Huracan STO uses the same engine as the Performante and the Evo, but the peak torque is 35Nm less, which might be due to newer emissions regulations. To compensate, Huracan STO is 43kgs lighter than the Huracan Performante.

To further aid the performance, the aerodynamics from the Huracan Performante was further tuned and improved, which resulted in 37% and 53% increase in aerodynamic efficiency and downforce, respectively.

The weight savings of over 40kgs was done by using carbon fibre for 75% of the body and using magnesium wheels. Further weight saving was done by manufacturing bonnet, bumper, and mudguard as a single element.

With less weight to haul around, Huracan STO can accelerate from 0-100 kph in under 3 seconds and onto a top speed of 310 kph, in between the 200 kph mark is covered in just 9 seconds.

Though Lamborghini directly has no roots to Formula 1, they somehow managed to utilise Brembo CCM-R carbon-ceramic brakes from F1 Cars, enabling the Huracan STO to stop from 100kph in under 30 meters.  

All this performance is not cheap though, the price starts from US $327,838 which is almost equal to the price of a Lamborghini Huracan Performante and a Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat, combined.

I am in no doubt that it will be really good super car, but at this price point it comes awfully close to all-conquering McLaren 765LT.

 

Athul Z

Content Creator, MyTyre.