Ferrari 296 Challenge 2025 review – Maranello's hybrid supercar goes V6-only

Recently we drove McLaren’s Artura Trophy Evo race car; now we’re behind the wheel of Ferrari’s 296 Challenge one-make racer. Like the McLaren, Maranello’s entry-level competition car loses its battery-driven hybrid system in favour of a racing-friendly, exclusively internal combustion V6 powertrain.

This is partly pragmatism, as hybrids are hard to manage in motorsport applications, but primarily because GT racing regs currently don’t allow for hybrid in the production-based categories. And this regulatory quirk inadvertently gives us a glimpse of a parallel universe. One in which Ferrari’s V6-engined supercar can run without heavy and complex hybrid technology. As we’re about to discover, it doesn’t disappoint.

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The 296 follows Maranello’s well-established bloodline of production-based one-make racers – one that began with the 348 Challenge way back in 1992. This track-focused 348 was so close to its series-production cousin that it remained street-legal. Its replacement – the 355 Challenge – wasn’t sold as a road-legal model, but it and subsequent 360 and 430 Challenge cars remained close enough to production specification that it’s not uncommon to see examples successfully registered for the road.

Whether anyone will attempt to make a 296 Challenge road-legal remains to be seen. It would certainly be a hell of a thing, for this seventh-generation Ferrari Challenge car (ninth if you count Evo versions of the 458 and 488) makes the biggest departure from road car specification thanks to those changes to the powertrain plus extensive work to the aerodynamics, chassis and braking systems, as well as plenty of tyre development from Pirelli.

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The result is a car that comprehensively outperforms its predecessor, Ferrari claiming that it’s two seconds faster around the fearsome Mugello circuit than the 488 Challenge Evo while also adding a new level of precision and consistency to the mix. This is not only to give Challenge competitors a fresh experience, but to better prepare them for the demands and characteristics of a current GT3 and perhaps even the 499P Le Mans racer, should they show the talent to progress.

Unsurprisingly, the 296 Challenge presents as much more of a racer than a road car, the stance, heavily aero-tuned bodywork and GT3-lite interior showing just how far Ferrari’s entry-level race car has come. It’s a serious-looking thing for sure, and the structure of our test has been carefully designed to mimic that of an accelerated Ferrari Challenge training camp. This means we have three track sessions with an instructor alongside us (lucky them), plus data analysis sessions in between to help us find more speed next time out.

Slipping through the side impact bars into a seat derived from the one fitted to the 296 GT3, you find yourself immersed in a cockpit that’s brilliantly functional and strikingly stylish. There’s plenty of rake and reach adjustment for the steering wheel and the seat is on runners. Primary controls are found on the wheel, with secondary switches on a separate panel. Forward visibility is excellent thanks to the 296’s low scuttle, while a rear-view camera helps you spot bogies on your six.

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The first session is spent getting used to the car and refreshing my memory of Circuito Monteblanco, which is hosting. The Spanish circuit can be configured in umpteen ways, so you’re never quite sure which version you’re going to be driving until you get there, but you can guarantee the long run down the start-finish straight and the big stop into Turn 1 will be highlights of the lap.

Along with the pared-back cockpit environment, reduced sound deadening and minimal exhaust silencing ensures the 296 Challenge is an altogether more aggressive machine than the road car. It’s not quite possessed of a full-house GT3’s swagger – thanks largely to the retention of the street car’s DCT rather than a whining race sequential – but it’s way more intense than the road car and with steely responses and the keenness of a freshly sharpened knife.

Despite the lack of hybrid assist, the 296 Challenge feels rampant when you get into the throttle, with plenty of force-fed turbocharged torque combined with a keener top-end that gives you an additional 500rpm to play with (the limiter is now at 8500rpm) plus peaks of 690bhp and 546lb ft, the latter arriving a fraction earlier than in the road car, at 6000rpm rather than 6250rpm. It equates to an impressive specific output of 230bhp per litre. What’s more, the Challenge is 140kg lighter than the road-going 296 GTB (dry weight is a quoted 1330kg), which goes a long way to mitigating the on-paper power shortfall. You certainly don’t miss the hybrid torque-fill. If anything, the power delivery feels more ferocious because the V6 is more vocal and it builds to a more discernible crescendo.

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As ever with slicks-and-wings racers, it’s the braking and cornering capabilities that require the deepest intake of breath to explore. Ferrari is rightly proud of the aero package, which wins buzzword bingo with a combination of splitter, S-Duct, multiple vortex generators, double-element diffuser and swan-neck wing supports. Not only does this package generate more downforce than any one-make Ferrari before it (870kg at 250kph, or 18 per cent more than its immediate predecessor the 488 Evo) but it maintains a more consistent aero balance for more approachable and exploitable cornering and braking capability.

It’s this attention to consistent, accessible performance rather than raw speed at the expense of drivability that appeals to customers (not all of whom are born racers) and defines the 296 Challenge. Far from diminishing the driver’s input, our test suggests it places greater emphasis on working to the machine’s lofty limits and matching the metronomic repeatability of its lap times.   

The 296 Challenge’s braking system uses the very latest CCM‑R Plus technology for the brake discs. Measuring 408mm diameter at the front and 390mm at the rear, these discs are manufactured using long carbonfibres in a multi-directional matrix to deliver a 100 per cent increase in durability and threefold improvement in thermal conductivity compared to regular CCM (Carbon Ceramic Material) technology. A special silicon-carbide ceramic coating further improves durability while offering excellent friction properties, with the latest computational fluid dynamics methods optimising duct geometry for improved brake cooling. As well as providing increased braking performance, the lifespan of the CCM‑R Plus disc is around three times that of the CCM version with no diminution in performance during the discs’ service life. Challenge customers aren’t exactly running on a tight budget – the car costs €390,000 (around £332k) – but this kind of saving is undoubtedly meaningful.

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Arguably of greater significance than the material advances is the use of a Track evolution of Ferrari’s super-impressive ABS Evo brake-by-wire system. Using information from the Challenge’s six-way dynamic sensors, it allows the car to precisely estimate the lateral, longitudinal and rotational acceleration to determine target slip values. The accuracy of these readings means the 296 Challenge can be consistently worked to new limits of pure retardation and walk the finest of lines between braking performance and lateral stability when braking deep into corners.

The final piece of the puzzle are Pirelli tyres specifically developed for the 296 Challenge. A wider, 280mm front tyre (up from 245mm on the road car) gives better turn-in for the chassis engineers to exploit, while careful design and simulation along with verification testing on a variety of international racetracks has produced a tyre that is quick to warm up (important when the grid comprises pros and ams) yet resists excessive wear and remains consistent throughout a race distance.

Unlike a GT3 car, in which you need to hit the brake pedal as hard as you can, the 296 Challenge’s brake-by-wire system demands a lighter touch. It’s no less positive, it just requires more subtlety; a rapid squeeze into the travel rather than gymnasium leg-press levels of effort. It takes a little while to dial yourself back and let the system’s booster generate the brake pressure, but once you do the whole thing clicks.

Outright stopping power is hugely impressive, more so because you’re not exerting yourself, but it’s into the chicanes, where you’re required to brake and turn, that the 296 feels especially impressive. Slowing and rotating with addictive energy, it has a fabulous sense of agility and uncanny apex-seeking accuracy.

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It’s no less impressive when you get back on the power. Especially when you start to make tweaks to the traction control system, which is adjusted via two rotary switches on the steering wheel, one marked TC1, which manages rotational stability on the way into a corner, the other marked TC2, which controls longitudinal traction under power.

Our first run is with both TC systems set to 3, which is fine to help you find your feet, but soon feels a little restrictive on a dry track. Switching to 2 frees the 296 up nicely, tidying your greedier throttle inputs but allowing a little slip. It’s the most flattering setting, as evidenced by the raggedness that comes when I finally switch to 1 in TC1 and TC2. It’s both humbling and motivating, the clear need for greater precision and discipline with braking, throttle and steering inputs sweetened by the 296’s transparency and responsiveness to subtle adaptations in your driving style.     

The more you drive the 296 Challenge the more you enjoy it. That’s partly because as you build familiarity and confidence you can really start to explore its cornering and braking performance, but it’s also due to the expressive character of the car. With little in the way of silencing and a lack of GPFs (gasoline particulate filters), the 3-litre V6 makes a glorious variety of snorts, snuffles, flutters and bellows depending on rpm and throttle position, and the way it punches out of corners and missiles down the straights is never less than thrilling. Find your feet with the TC systems and you can really feel the car move around, and though neat and tidy generally wins the race, the 296 Challenge feels like a car you could really hustle if you were fighting for position.

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Even by Ferrari standards the 296 Challenge is something truly special. Very much the contemporary GT racer but still infused with some of the road car’s approachability, this latest Ferrari Challenge car has been developed to appeal to wealthy amateurs but also continue the series’ tradition for finding exceptional talent. The prime example being Nicklas Nielsen, who went from winning the European Ferrari Challenge in 2018 to winning Le Mans in a 499P in 2024.

If only the incoming 296 Challenge Stradale/Scuderia/Speciale/Pista (delete as applicable) road car could also ditch its heavy hybrid system and constricting GPFs. Then we’d have a Ferrari that’s laden with cutting-edge aero and dazzling electronics but also brimming with old-school character. It’ll never happen, but we can but dream.

Ferrari 296 Challenge specs

This story was first featured in evo issue 331.