Review 2024 Lamborghini Huracán Stellato excels on-road but yearns for dirt
I have spent almost my entire life in the dirt. As a kid, I spent weekends in the desert in iconic California desert locations like Glamis, Johnson Valley, and Ocotillo Wells, driving 3-wheelers and later my father's Volkswagen Dune buggy. As an adult, I raced air-cooled VWs in events like the Baja 1000 and rallied stock cars in navigation challenges like the Rebelle Rally. More recently, I built and raced a lifted Miata and finished on the podium.
I know how to drive a car in the dirt and stay within its limits. So when Lamborghini told me I could own a Huracan Stellato, but I had to keep it on the pavement, I was more than a little offended.
I can't tell you how Lambo's lifted supercar actually behaves when the road surface gets a little rough, but in this review I will tell you how it drives in town and how it behaves off-road. I will also try to delve into the technical aspects as much as possible.
The Stellato was introduced last year as a send-off for the off-road-focused Huracán, and all 1,499 units were sold out. I can't drive it off-road, but I can use it as my daily driver in a small desert town. Hoo boy, am I getting attention. It looks like a geometric pancake to me, but the matte green color, black wheel cladding, and roof rack are perfect for my rough-and-tumble personality. When I stop at a red light or enter Chipotle, I get attention from all the others. Some are avid fans and come up to me to ask about the car. Others glare at me from afar and pass by with “Go Back to L.A.” stickers on their back windows. In other words, I am a local.
For a week, I ran my daily errands, noticing that the seats were neither rock-hard nor snug enough to make a woman's butt feel constricted.
The Stellato is nearly two inches higher than a standard Huracan, 6.4 inches off the ground. This height makes getting in and out easier; I took my 81-year-old mother for a test ride and she had no problems. She still scraped the front once or twice, especially on steep driveways, but for the most part she had no problems.
The front trunk has about 4 cubic feet of space, enough for a bag or two of groceries.
Rear visibility, however, is terrible. If any car needs a rear camera mirror, it would be the Stellato. The standard rearview mirror only shows the louvers above the engine compartment. It sure looks cool from the outside, but you have to be prepared to use the side mirrors to make up the difference.
My favorite interior feature is the steering wheel. It is the perfect size for my hands, is covered in suede for better grip, and has a flat bottom so there is room for my knees. I didn't like the directional switches on the steering wheel, but I feel like they allow me to grip the steering wheel more firmly when signaling. I want this on my car.
However, the infotainment system is not good. The system is very laggy and Apple CarPlay seems to be buggy and dropped out a number of times. I went through all the menus and couldn't find an efficiency calculator, so I don't know exactly how many miles I drove while in this car; the EPA puts the Stellato's fuel economy at 15 mpg. The Stellato has the ability to display latitude, longitude, and current heading. As a map geek, I appreciate this very much.
Driving around town is fairly easy in Strada mode, which curbs the 5.2-liter V-10 engine; the seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission shifts quickly and is not harsh. In this mode, stress-free cruising around town is easy. However, the roof rack makes a lot of wind noise, especially at high speeds. The road noise from the Bridgestone Dueler A/T tires and the intense sound of the V10's V10 make it almost impossible to hear the podcast as you trot down the freeway.
But this is Lamborghini, and I want to feel the 602 ponies and 413 lb-ft of torque. There are plenty of flat, straight, paved (unfortunately) roads nearby. We do a reconnaissance run to make sure the roads are in good condition, then turn around and switch to sport mode. Starts off, presses down on the pedal... Something.... It takes a beat to get power from the start. But the moment I get into second gear, the Stellato comes into its own, and my heart begins to race. Maybe I've been driving too many pure electric cars with instant torque lately, but this car's 0-62 mph time of 3.4 seconds no longer feels almost slow. Lucid would beat this car off the line.
Not to worry. The Uracan's successor, the Temerario, will be an electric model with Lamborghini's official 0-62 mph time of 2.7 seconds and more than 900 hp of power. Amazing.
Still, when you drive the Stellato to triple-digit speeds, the car is confident and solid, with no rhythmic reaction from the rear wheels when you brake. On the twisties, the A/T tires feel less grippy on the pavement than other Huracans, but the Stellato still maneuvers along mountain roads at 70-80 mph without a problem.
The Huracan Stellato is well behaved on-road, but it uses many off-road parts. Bridgestone all-terrain tires in sizes 235/40/R19 in the front and 285/40/R19 in the rear make the tread look like a good compromise between on-road and off-road driving. Smaller wheels would allow for wider sidewalls, but the Stellato has honk-big brakes, and 19-inch wheels are the limit.
The Stellato does not come with a spare tire, which is a bad idea. Tire failure is the number one problem encountered when venturing off the pavement. The Bridgestones are run-flat, so theoretically you could go 50 miles at 50 mph and not get a puncture in the sidewall or tread. However, if you've ever driven off-road, you know that sidewall scratches are more common than punctures. My recommendation is to strap a full-size spare to the roof rack. That's what it's there for.
Don't even think about conquering the Rubicon Trail in this car. Ground clearance may be lifted to 6.4 inches, but that's less than your typical crossover SUV. Geometry is as awful as ever, with approach, breakover, and departure angles of 10.4, 14.7, and 26.5 degrees, respectively. To be fair, the departure angles are actually quite good, 0.1 degree better than the Ford Ranger Raptor. Still, if you try to get over anything other than small obstacles, you will scrape most everything else, and while there is some protection under the car, it is not what I would call sturdy.
I bring my car to a local oil change place so I can get a good look under the car. Lamborghini has added metal protection to the front and midsection, but it is only about 215 inches thick. Hard plastic is used in places, and the one covering the engine is the flimsiest. Nothing covers the exhaust system.
As for the suspension, the Stellato's magnetic dampers are not long travel, nor do the control arms appear long. Lamborghini did not confirm this, but we cannot imagine that the Stellato has longer wheel travel than the road-going Huracan model. Between the geometry and wheel travel, this car is meant for flat rally roads with a bit of washboard. I would not drive hoops at speed.
But I would take it to the dunes. Just inflate the tires and let the all-wheel drive system and automatic rear locker do the work. The sand wouldn't damage anything under the car, and if I lifted up just before I got onto the dune, it wouldn't start. There might still be the problem of the nose rubbing when descending from a steep dune, but the diagonal should solve that problem. My plan with this car was to drive it around the soft sands of Pismo Beach and take some spectacular pictures, but alas, the Lamborghini lawyers refused my pleasure and yours.
As I mentioned earlier, the cars are all pre-ordered, so I don't have to worry about raking in the roughly $280,000 it would cost to buy one off the showroom floor. This price includes a $2,100 gas tax and a $3,695 destination charge. This price also doesn't include the $16,500 for the matte green paint, $7,600 for the sport seats, $6,000 for the forged wheels, and $2,600 for the front LED rally lights like the ones I bought at AutoZone. My test car cost $360,349, which is seven times the cost of my graduate-level education.
Still, there is no denying that the Stellato is the easiest of the Lamborghini Huracans to drive. The higher ride height allows me to trot around town without fear of speed bumps, and the Strada mode keeps the power level manageable when the speed limit is low. It would also be fun to drive on smooth dirt roads. But how would I know that?
.
