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2020 Lamborghini Urus Luggage Test | Loading the bull

A Lamborghini was recently at my house, which is sort of like the queen dropping in. And though I assiduously avoided carrying anything that could spill, splash, smudge or muss, one aspect of the 2020 Lamborghini Urus we wanted to check was just how much luggage it can carry considering the limitations imposed by the SUV's extremely sloped roofline. So I hopped onto the Lamborghini Store's website to order up just the right stuff, co-branded by Lamborghini and TecknoMonster — hmm, perhaps the carbon-fiber small trolley case for $4,904, or the carbon-fiber Bynomio big trolley case for $7,874, or the Bynomio Hold Maxi carbon-fiber suitcase for $17,388. Perhaps the whole set. Now you might be saying to yourself, "That's sure an expensive way to haul my clean underwear." But rest assured these suitcases emerge from the autoclave after a cutting-edge aerospace process that merges two different types of carbon fiber and ensures "top performance and excellent mechanical properties, requiring extreme accuracy in all manufacturing steps." Pity the fool who has a suitcase that's anything less. But tragically, there's at least a 20-day lead time in ordering, and the Urus was only here for the weekend. So I guess that fool is me, having to resort to the same old world-weary, beat-up suitcases I usually use, which share space in the garage with the lawn tractor and cat litter box. Six suitcases were at my disposal. Three would need to be checked at the airport, and one of those is particularly ungainly (29x19x11 inches, 26x17x10, 25x16x10). Three others would be small enough to carry on (24x14x10, 23x14x11, 22x14x9), if we were getting on airplanes anymore. Several of these bags have four wheels that jut out and were counted in the dimensions. It's a shame not to have Riswick's wife's fancy bag for such a fancy car. The Lamborghini Urus is pretty big. At 201 inches long and 79 inches wide, it is 2 inches longer than a Ford Explorer, and the same width. It's 4 inches shorter than the big Mercedes-Benz GLS, but 2 inches wider. Plus, those are vehicles with third-row seating; the Urus has two rows and seats five. (Four if you get the backseat buckets and console.) Yet its cargo hold is 21.75 cubic feet, which is only about 3 cubic feet bigger than the others' space behind the third row. It's also much less than various five-seat, midsize SUVs. We're told it is wide enough to fit a couple bags of golf clubs, which looks feasible.

2015 Lamborghini Aventador LP 700-4 Roadster Review

"Lamborghini Murcielago." That's what I would tell anyone who asked what my favorite car was. Yes, there were easier cars to drive than the wailing wraith from Sant'Agata Bolgnese, and that was partly why I liked it so. It was impossible to see out the back – reversing was easiest done with the door open, sitting on the sill. My head banged the door frame when I checked traffic on the left. The seat made my butt hurt. The cabin ergonomics were based on a design language that humans haven't yet translated. It boiled over in stop-and-go traffic. It was big. Yet it drove like nothing else, with the instant zig-zag reflexes of a mako designed in The Matrix. The Murcielago's thrills weren't laid out on the ground, you had to dig for them with your bare hands. And that's what made it outstanding. When I first drove the Aventador at its launch in Rome, I spent the day blasting around the circuit at Vallelunga. It was so easy to drive – "too easy by half," as Jeremy Clarkson would later say of it – viciously quick, unholy fun, and very good. But it was a little too easy to drive. Which is why the Murcielago remained my favorite car, ever. Until two weeks ago. The Aventador came when the rough-diamond Gallardo was Lamborghini's in-house reference for ease-of-use. But now we have the fire-and-forget Huracan. Having driven one after the other, and on the context of LA streets instead of the smooth and open landscape of Vallelunga or Laguna Seca, I now see the Aventador for what it truly is: the representation of the bull that's on the Lamborghini badge – head-down, horns-out anger. Like the Murcielago, the Aventador is big. It's more than ten inches longer than a Chevrolet Corvette, five inches wider than a Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat, and 3.5 inches wider than a Dodge Viper. It is also low, an inch lower than the already ground-floor Huracan. I won't pretend to be rational about it: the Aventador says everything I want a car to say. It's the certain, antidotal statement to brief and befuddled everyday lives. The cabin is a cockpit in every sense: close-fitted, button-filled, lit up. I'm five-foot-eleven, and I wear it like a tailored suit. I gave a ride to a guy who's six-foot-three and perhaps 260 pounds, so it can fit much larger frames but I still don't know how he got in or out through that scissor-door opening. The trunk in the Murcielago was big enough to hold a single dream.

The rationale behind Lamborghini's Urus

If you've been following developments in Sant'Agata Bolognese lately, you'll know that the world's most unabashed supercar producer is adding an SUV. Code-named "Urus," it will join the brand's existing two-model (Aventador/Huracan) lineup. It's a bold move for a company with a reputation built on iconic two-seaters including the Miura, Countach, and Diablo, and by its CEO's own admission the decision "will radically change Lamborghini." Why risk the company's exclusive, extroverted image on a vehicle associated with mundane tasks and parents who can't bear the thought of driving a minivan? Two reasons, says CEO Stephan Winkelmann. "The SUV Segment is still fast growing worldwide," he notes. Indeed, global demand for SUVs is up 88 percent since 2008, making utility vehicles the fastest-growing segment around the world, according to IHS Automotive. Utilities now comprise 19 percent of the global vehicle market. In addition, "sales can be equally distributed over our three major regions...the Americas (the US is Lambo's top market), EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa), and Asia Pacific." Lamborghini expects Urus to double sales from its current 2,500 cars per year to nearly 5,000. Adding a third model line "supports more consistent volumes and competitiveness of the company and our dealers," he continues. Further, Winkelmann maintains that an SUV fits the DNA of Lamborghini. "Our brand has a history of many types of cars such as GTs, super sports cars, and with the LM002 from 1986 to 1992, even an SUV. We learned together with our designers and product people that the SUV represented this opportunity the best." Structural implications include an expansion of the diminutive company's roughly 1,200-employee workforce by 50 percent, or 500 new hires, and the construction of a new facility near its headquarters to build the Urus. Building the new Lamborghini in Bologna is key to differentiating Urus from the other Volkswagen Group premium SUVs (Bentley Bentayga; Porsche Cayenne; Audi Q7 and Q8; and Volkswagen Touareg) that will share the same platform, and Winkelmann put great effort into persuading VW the move made economic sense. "We worked many months building the business case for approval because we are convinced the SUV will be a success and the best place to build it is in Sant'Agata Bolognese," Winkelmann stresses. "We are not simply adding another line in an existing building. Rather, we are talking about greenfield construction.