When Lamborghini Was Huge

A truck made for jungle, oil field, or the parking lot of your local steakhouse.

Any guy who likes fast, outrageous cars rightly rejects the “compensation” theory. Sometimes, a Jaguar E-Type is just an E-Type, a beautiful, fast, utterly phallic British sports car. But in the event that you are looking to augment your arsenal, the world’s biggest codpiece is up for auction: the 1989 Lamborghini LM002 in lustrous rosso. Lamborghini originally intended to sell this humongous, 5900-lb, off-road vehicle to international militaries. When that fell through, they replaced the prototype’s Chrysler V8 with the 450-hp V12 out of the Countach and fitted specially-made 345-width Pirelli Scorpion off-road tires. On the road, it could hit sixty in 7.7 seconds (the Hummer H1, a decade later, took 15.5). The ultimate luxury dune buggy was born.

One of only 301 produced, this example has a five-speed manual transmission, six Weber carburetors, and only 18,000 miles from new. The interior is well-preserved, with recently refinished wood trim, and the paint is pristine.  

To this day, the LM002 is the most outrageous car ever produced by Lamborghini, a company known for outlandish designs. Incredibly imposing, supremely capable and more macho that John Wayne’s tobacco spit, this car is the ultimate act of self-aggrandizement. If anyone gets Freudian on you, flatten them with one of the foot-wide Pirellis. [Estimate: $175,000-$225,000; RM Auctions]

Photos by Lamborghini

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