Nico Rosberg may have won a Formula 1 World Driver’s Championship with the Mercedes-AMG Petronas team but he also has quite a good relationship with Ferrari and recently had the chance to drive a rare Monza SP1 around the Fiorano test track.
Ferrari will only build 499 examples of the single-seat Monza SP1 and two-seat Monza SP2 together so very few people other than Ferrari engineers and owners have had the opportunity to drive the monstrous speedster. As Rosberg discovered during a recent factory visit to Ferrari, this is not a car to be messed with.
Powering both the Ferrari Monza SP1 and Monza SP2 is a naturally-aspirated 6.5-liter V12 engine producing 799 hp and 530 lb-ft (719 Nm) of torque, resulting in a 0-62 mph (100 km/h) sprint of 2.9 seconds, 0-124 mph (200 km/h) in 7.9 seconds, and a top speed exceeding 186 mph (300 km/h).
Watch: Nico Rosberg Pits McLaren Senna And 720S Against Each Other
One of the things that immediately strikes Rosberg while behind the wheel of the SP1 is how much wind noise there is. For a successful F1 driver, we thought Rosberg may be quite accustomed to the wind noise of such vehicles but clearly the Monza has very little in the way of wind deflectors. This comes despite the fact that Ferrari developed a ‘Virtual Wind Shield’ technology for the car that it claims deviates enough air to ensure the car is comfortable to drive.
During his test, Rosberg was able to explore just how fast the car is, hitting over 250 km/h (155 mph) on the circuit’s short straight.