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Or fiddle with the seats - Sparco racing buckets with carbon shells. Like all pukka competition chairs they look fabulous, but also manage to be fantastically comfortable. In fact, the Superleggera's driving position is spot-on, an ergonomic triumph that defies decades of Lamborghini-sponsored anatomical misery.

The (Audi RS4) steering wheel feels good in your hands, you can see all the instruments and dials, the centre console buttons (Audi again) work properly, and the aircon actually conditions the air rather than issuing the occasional lukewarm cough (you'd have to suspect an Audi influence here too).

Best of all, the Gallardo is really quite small, and has that fitness-for-purpose feel that's served the Porsche 911 so well all these years.

Lamborghini's options book is a very hefty document that contains many ludicrously expensive items; you can order a roll-over bar, a fire extinguisher, carbon-ceramic brakes and that useless four-point race harness, among other costly supplements.

Hell, even the manual gearbox is an option. How carried away you get depends on your personal solvency and how often you plan to attack the track. But don't expect to see too many of these things dicing with MkII Golf GTIs and Lancer Evo VIIs round Snetterton any time soon.

Which raises a moot point. These top-end so-called track cars: are they merely highly profitable garnish for the 'brand', or the real thing? The existing Gallardo - despite its weight and four-wheel drive - has always been mighty effective on a circuit, but the only time I've ever seen one on a track I'd driven it there myself. Would a real person be daft enough?

They might now. We're heading north on Highway 2, past Pasadena, and the traffic has thinned out. Few surfaces on the planet are as abrasive as the ancient concrete on the Los Angeles freeway system, but the Superleggera's ride proves to be impressively supple: the damping has been recalibrated but the suspension is largely the same sophisticated wishbone set-up as before.

A colossal expansion joint up ahead bounces some hideous Buick into the next lane, but the Lamborghini stretches and compresses beautifully. California is practically a police state, but I can't hold off any longer. Sixth, fifth, fourth and into third... the Gallardo's V10 hardens in note as we work our way through that wonderful 'box and the revs climb aggressively (peak power arrives at a wonderfully raucous 8,000rpm).