It’s been nearly 15 years since Ferrari supercars stopped shipping with a manual transmission on board, but the company decided to throw a bone to the stick-shift enthusiasts by releasing the limited-run 12Cilindri Manuale coupe.
The car comes equipped with a system called Manuale Shift-By-Wire. It adds a clutch pedal and an open-gate six-speed manual shifter to the cabin. The driver is supposed to interact with these, but the 6.5-liter V12 under the hood stays the same, as does its eight-speed dual-clutch transmission.
Ferrari claims that the imitation enables drivers to rev up their engines and otherwise get the look and feel of a genuine manual gearbox while staying safe from the accidental downshifts known as the “money shifts”. The main drawback is that you won’t be getting to the car’s rated top speed of 340 kilometers per hour (211 mph) in the sixth gear – gears number 7 and 8 are only available if you switch back to automatic.
Only 1,499 Ferrari 12Cilindri Manuale units will be offered worldwide, starting from €590,000 in Italy. For comparison, the standard supercar starts from around €400,000. The massive price difference includes the opportunity to customize your example via the automaker’s Tailor Made program.