As much as we admire the Lamborghini Gallardo, the supercar has had a very long shelflife; in fact, the very first models appeared roughly ten years ago. Now its replacement, named the Cabrera, has been spotted testing at Nurburgring and more recently out in public in near undisguised form.
As you can see from the lead pic the new car takes many of its design cues from bigger brother Aventador, including those angular headlamps and that side blade treatment.
What the Cabrera won’t share however, is the larger car’s carbon-fibre backbone. One of the reasons that the Cabrera has had such a long gestation period is that it will share a large number of components with its cousin, the upcoming Audi R8. Expect liberal usage of aluminium under the skin and probably a good deal of carbon-fibre on the outside. Lamborghini has claimed that the newcomer will weigh in excess of 200 kg less than the Gallardo.
Under the bonnet there is reputed to be a much revised version of the same 5,2-litre V10 that does duty in the Gallardo, but with an uprated output of 450 kW. But we can expect the tardy single-clutch transmission to be replaced by a much smoother and user-friendly duel-clutch unit.
For the current Gallardo’s last hurrah grab a copy of the January issue of CAR, on sale 16 December 2013.