If, back in the pandemic days, you found yourself with a little bit too much time to spare in front of the computer, it might have led to a lot of gaming or impulse purchasing. I can definitely confirm I was guilty of both, and on the former, Wordle was a habit that took a long time to shake off. Fast forward all these years, and the legacy it created spawned many other games, one of them being introduced to us by Dave. It’s Cardle, and the idea here is similar to Wordle: you have a limited amount of guesses to determine the car of the day, based on a few, sometimes tricky, angles of a single photograph.
After playing it for quite some time, and using it as an excuse to start car talk at any given morning, we’re now kicking off a new series: Cardle of the Day, where we work through each puzzle and then spend a few hundred words celebrating whatever car the game decided to throw at us. We will try to write about “the car of the day” whenever we get a chance, so feel free to come back every day. We’ll post them later in the evening to avoid spoilers! And what a way to start, because today, it threw a good one!
Five Clues, One Very Red Car
Today’s puzzle opened with a crop so tight it offered almost nothing to work with other than the rosso colour, the badge, and the wheel size. Enough to know the brand, sure, but unless you really know their portfolio, you’d be excused to mix it with other contemporary releases. Clues two, three, and four gradually pulled back, revealing more of the car’s flanks and proportions, but only definitive enough to commit by end of four.
Clue five changed things. With enough of the bodywork visible, like those sculpted air intakes, the low, wide stance, the unmistakable mid-engine silhouette, maybe the answer snapped fully into focus. Ferrari 488 GTB.
Wait? Isn’t that a 458?
The Ferrari 488 GTB arrived in 2015 as the direct successor to the 458 Italia, and it had a significant job to do. The 458 had been almost universally adored, so replacing it with a turbocharged engine was a genuine risk, and a big window into what we could expect from them moving forward. Ferrari fitted the 488 with a twin-turbocharged 3.9-litre V8 producing 660 horsepower. Whether or not you’re a fan of the spooly addition, that engine went on to win the International Engine of the Year award three years running, from 2017 to 2019.
The sceptics who worried that forced induction would blunt the character of a Ferrari road car were largely won over. The 488 GTB could reach 100 km/h from rest in 3s (remember, this was not that common back then) and on to a top speed of 330 km/h, figures that were genuinely startling for a road legal car of its era. More importantly, the chassis and steering retained enough feedback to keep driving enthusiasts satisfied.
More Than Just the Numbers
The 488 GTB also spawned a racing lineage that reinforced its credentials. The 488 GTE and 488 GT3 variants competed at the highest levels of endurance racing, including Le Mans, giving the road car a motorsport connection that Ferrari has always understood matters to buyers. And these cars just look stunning with a race setup and livery! The GTB itself was in production until 2019, when it was succeeded by the F8 Tributo, but the 488 still remains a fixture in the used market and on track days, where its combination of power and accessibility keeps it popular, and caught in an in-between phase of exotic cars that seems to be appreciating by the day.
The 488 GTB felt like the right car for a Monday morning Cardle, and the kick-off for our series! See you tomorrow.
