The Genesis Magma GT’s V8 Soundtrack From That Hill Climb Is Already Causing Problems For Ferrari Loyalists
Genesis released footage this week of the Magma GT concept attacking the Tutto Bene Hillclimb on Mount Mottarone in the Italian Alps — and the video does something a spec sheet never could. The 3.2-liter twin-turbo V8, producing up to 800 horsepower and mounted directly behind the driver, fills the mountain valley with a deep, layered exhaust note that sounds less like a Korean luxury prototype and more like something built 90 minutes south in Maranello.
The timing is pointed. Genesis chose Ferrari and Lamborghini’s home territory for the Magma GT’s first dynamic demonstration, and the car delivered. On damp asphalt along the closed Strada Borromea, the low-slung coupe showed brief wheelspin off the line, held a composed, flat attitude through 51 corners, and — most importantly — sounded like it belonged there. Whether it actually belongs there is a conversation the footage has already started.
The Tutto Bene Hillclimb is an invitation-only gathering organized by Los Angeles-based Race Service and Milan-based BorromeodeSilva. It’s not a timed competition — no rankings, no stopwatch. The 85 cars invited this year drove the 9-kilometer Strada Borromea as a moving showcase of automotive culture, with Lake Maggiore visible in the distance. Getting an invitation means you’ve already cleared a certain threshold of credibility.
Genesis cleared it with a concept car. That’s the detail worth sitting with. The Magma GT was first shown statically at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June — a beautiful object that didn’t move. At Mottarone, it moved. Wet conditions kept the driver from pushing hard, but the footage from the NM2255 Raw Car Sounds channel captures what matters: the V8 spooling under load, the chassis staying planted through damp corners, and an exhaust note that carries the kind of mechanical authority that no amount of sound engineering can fake. This is a functional driving prototype, not a rolling design study.
The Engine Has Racing DNA Worth Taking Seriously
The 3.2-liter twin-turbo V8 in the Magma GT isn’t a bespoke road-car engine developed in isolation. Its architecture shares lineage with the powertrain in Genesis’s GMR-001 LMDh prototype, which competes in the World Endurance Championship — the same series that runs Le Mans, Spa, and Fuji. A hybridized version of this engine has been stress-tested at the highest level of endurance racing, which is a more demanding durability program than most road-car development cycles ever see.
The engineering thread runs deeper still. The V8’s modular architecture traces back to Hyundai’s 1.6-liter turbocharged four-cylinder from the i20 N WRC rally car — a scaling approach that takes a proven competition foundation and builds upward. The result, in the Magma GT, is claimed output of up to 800 horsepower sent entirely to the rear wheels, with no hybrid assist. Genesis Brand Director for Italy and France Charles Fuster told Motor1 Italy that the Magma GT is not a temporary exercise, and that the brand wants to reach production sooner rather than later. A production version is expected by 2030, with 2027 or 2028 cited in multiple reports as a possible earlier target — though Genesis hasn’t confirmed a date.
The Emotional Challenge to Italian Supercar Identity
The rivals the Magma GT is positioning against — the Ferrari 296 GTB, McLaren Artura, Chevrolet Corvette — each carry decades of combustion performance credibility. Ferrari just unveiled the 296 GT Modificata, a track-only evolution of the 296 platform producing around 720 horsepower from a 2.9-liter twin-turbo V6. The Corvette C8 Z06 is a known quantity in the mid-engine space. Genesis has none of that history.
What it does have, as of this week, is video evidence that a Korean luxury brand can drive a mid-engine V8 grand tourer through the Italian Alps and make it sound right. That’s a lower bar than a production car, but it’s a higher bar than a press release. The Magma GT’s significance isn’t purely about horsepower numbers — it’s about the moment when a brand built on sedans and SUVs plants a flag in supercar territory while the European establishment is retreating from combustion performance. Audi is winding down combustion programs. BMW’s M division is pushing into hybrid territory. Mercedes-AMG has electrified its flagship. Genesis is going the other direction.
The current production Magma model is the 2027 GV60 Magma crossover, a battery-electric SUV starting at $69,950 with 641 horsepower from two electric motors. The GT is a different proposition entirely — a rear-wheel-drive, combustion-only, mid-engine coupe that Genesis has confirmed will reach production by decade’s end. Also at Mottarone was the X Skorpio concept, a matte-black off-road study with a tubular chassis and massive 40-inch tires, piloted up the hillclimb by Genesis Magma Racing driver André Lotterer. It’s a wilder, less production-likely machine — but it reinforces that Genesis is building an entire performance ecosystem, not just one halo car.
Whether the production Magma GT can genuinely compete with Italian exhaust notes on feeling, not just lap times, is still an open question. The hillclimb footage answers the first one: the car is real, it runs, and on a mountain road in northern Italy, it sounded like it had every right to be there.
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