Old footage of Lamborghini testing the 1987 Lamborghini Countach is going viral for how incredibly unhinged it looked.
Back then, automakers didn’t have to deal with the endless red tape of today.
And it shows.
And there’s something else keen-eyed car fans will have spotted.
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Old Lamborghini testing wasn’t for the faint of heart
Back in the 1980s, automakers didn’t have to deal with the endless red tape and health and safety regulation books the size of ‘War and Peace’.
The 1987 Lamborghini Countach, for example, was developed in an era when airbags weren’t even mandatory.
In the clip shared by CBS, Lamborghini’s chief test driver Valentino Balboni can be seen driving the supercar around the highways and streets of Italy in a Countach as if he’s driving around a race track.
Balboni was driving quite fast, and in a way some people today would consider reckless.
But things were a lot more… relaxed back then.
If you wanted to do the same thing today, you’d have to go through several bureaucratic entities, and they’d probably say no anyway.
Only real ‘hardcore’ car fans will recognize the driver
Valentino Rossi is arguably Italy’s most famous Valentino (aside from the fashion designer, of course) but hardcore fans will have certainly recognized the second-most famous Valentino in Italy, Valentino Balboni.
Balboni was the protagonist of a story that would almost certainly never be written today.
He joined Lamborghini as an apprentice mechanic in 1968 and he ended up becoming the company’s chief test driver.
Shortly after joining the company, the founder himself – Ferruccio Lamborghini – personally asked Balboni if he wanted to test drive new Lambos ahead of production, which is also something that would never happen today.
Balboni said yes, and that’s how he ended up working as chief test driver for Lamborghini for about 40 years.
From the Gallardo to the Murciélago, from the Countach to the Diablo, Balboni has test driven and green-lighted every Lamborghini built between 1968 and 2008.
He retired in 2008, and Lamborghini created the Gallardo LP550-2 Valentino Balboni (pictured above) in his honor.
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