Lamborghini Huracan Sterrato: Jeremy Clarkson review

In action: the Lamborghini Huracan Sterrato

Back in 1974, just after an oil crisis had ripped the guts out of the motor industry, some chaps in London, named Bunter and Tufty probably, decided that it would be a wheeze to stage a rally for ordinary production cars from London to Munich – via Nigeria.

In their minds, such a thing would be possible because three years earlier the extremely wild Cream drummer Ginger Baker had driven a Range Rover across the Sahara. So how hard would it be for a chap when he wasn’t off his face on pharmaceuticals?

It didn’t go terribly well. Of the 70 cars that set off from London, only seven reached Nigeria. And only five made it back to Munich. You’d have thought after this debacle that desert racing would be consigned to a file marked “unwise”. Or “only if you’re stoned”. But no. Because just three years later, Johnny French decided to organise a 10,000km rally from Paris to Dakar in Senegal.

Weirdly, their attempt was such a success it became an annual event. Soon the big manufacturers started to bring along cars they had built specifically for the Dakar Rally, and in 1988 there were more than 600 competitors. It had become huge, and I sort of get it because it’s rogue hero territory out there. Then along came ISIS, or whatever it was called back then, and all of a sudden the Sahara was a no-go area. The rally moved to South America and then to Saudi Arabia. So now, like everything that moves to that neck of the woods, the glamour has gone.

Or has it? Because our memories of the glory days live on. And now they are being made into modern-day reality. Porsche has just launched an armour-plated jacked-up version of the 911 called the Dakar. Morgan has something similar, and Lamborghini has just introduced us to the barking-mad Huracan Sterrato (Italian for dirt road). The Sterrato is not as fast as the normal version. It won’t corner as quickly either, or stop as well. But what it will do, we’re told, is a huge power slide on a gravel track.

On the track.

To achieve this, the suspension has longer travel, the undersides are fitted with armour plating, the tyres are chunky, there’s a new “rally” driving mode and a snorkel.

Has this ruined the spirit of the original Huracan? No. If anything, it has added even more Lamborghinishness. And a man can never have too much of that in his life.

Inside, they’ve removed the carpets and door linings so that you could pretty well clean it in there with a hosepipe. And there’s absolutely nowhere to put anything, apart from the wafer-thin glove box that isn’t even big enough for the co-driver’s pace notes.

Don’t get the wrong idea, though. While it’s pared back in there, it’s not even remotely uncomfortable. Because of the new suspension and the squidgy tyres, it simply glides over potholes as though they’re not there. And if you shut the exhausts up by putting it in road mode, it’s quiet too. By far and away, then, this is the most comfortable and civilised ­supercar I’ve ever driven.

In the cabin.

Some people are saying it’s so comfortable and civilised you could use it every day. But that’s nonsense. Getting in and out is hard if, like me, you’re shaped like a hippopotamus. And thanks to the snorkel, visibility out of the back renders the rear-view mirror useless. So it’s as practical every day as a scuba suit.

Speed? Well, despite the changes and the added weight, it’s still as fast as hell but it’s gigglesome speed. And because it has four-wheel drive, you don’t have the worry, which I do in various modern-day Ferraris, that when you put your foot down hard in second, the rear wheels will light up and you’ll crash into a tree. The Lambo just grips and goes.

Can you really take the thing off road? I don’t have any gravel tracks on the farm. The council won’t allow it for some reason. So I had to take the Sterrato into a field and on wet grass it sort of wobbled about like a horsebox lorry in a gymkhana car park. And it kept catching its nose on ant hills.

Hopefully I can find a suitable track and persuade Lamborghini to let me borrow it again, but this is a limited edition special, so I doubt it’ll happen. Pity, because if it’s as good as everyone says it is on gravel, it would be the perfect way of living the Dakar dream without risking all the bothersome business of being captured by an ISIS gun runner.

Lamborghini Huracan Sterrato

Engine: 5.2-litre V10, petrol

Performance: 0-100km/h 3.4 seconds, top speed 260km/h

Price: From $504,000

Jeremy’s rating: 4 out of 5