First, let me assure our readers that those of you who ordered Alfa Romeo’s 8C Competizione will get their cars as scheduled. Autoblog broke news via Italiaspeed.com that Fiat is ready to delay bringing more mainstream Alfa Romeo models to our shores in light of a weakening economy. Fiat is facing its own decline in sales in Europe. Times are tough.
Reports indicate that for Alfa to really make a profit in North America, the cars would have to be built here due to an unfavorable exchange rate versus the Euro. With The Big Three shuttering factories, Alfa Romeo is poised to take the pick of the litter if Fiat allows. It should be noted here that Ontario has offered enormous financial incentives to Fiat, but the company is exploring possibilities in Canada, the US, and Mexico.
Alfa Romeo currently builds some very handsome, well-performing automobiles these days, but it will take time, work, and money to prove that these are not the ill-tempered, fussy cars Alfa Romeo left us with when they left this market in 1995, when the last front-drive 164 was sold. Alfa Romeo will never be a mainstream brand here, nor should it be. Continue reading →
I’m on vacation this week, and it’s a tradition for us to head up to the Berkshire Mountains in western Massachusetts for a nice drive, see some good foliage and eat a lot. On our trip up, I always drive by a striking old red brick garage that has Alfa Romeo’s of all vintages and states of repair. I stopped this year and took a couple shots. I wasn’t sure if this was something you would want to post to TG, but I thought I’d share a garage that I find interesting. The garage in question is Alfas Unlimited, in Norfolk, CT. Back in high school and college I had an ‘86 Alfa Romeo Graduate Spyder, red with black top and interior. Fun little car, it broke my heart when its head cracked. It was my sophomore year in college, and we got hit with a serious blizzard. The car was snowed in for a week. I finally went to start her up, and within minutes the entire college parking lot was filled with smoke. Poor thing couldn’t handle that kind of cold. Since then I’ve always longed for a GTV-6. Some day.
Every now and then, we do a favour and put up a classified ad here in The Garage, but only if the car in question has enough cool factor. Now I’ve never had what most would call a traditional sense of cool when it comes to cars, but this one is just too hip to pass up.
This 1973 Alfa Romeo 2000 Berlina belongs to one of the guys in our shop and was passed down through the family. It is somewhat unique in that it did endure more than a few Canadian winters in the past and yet, thanks to some apparently decent rust proofing it didn’t dissolve into the atmosphere like most of it’s brethren. Continue reading →
If the other videos this morning haven’t woken you up yet, then turn the speakers up really loud and this one is sure to do the trick. Gary Sheehan takes us for a lap of Infineon Raceway in the 1966 Alfa Romeo GTA that Horst Kwech won the 66 Trans Am championship with.
I’ve got to admit that most of the modern super lux sports cars of the last few years haven’t turned my crank. I mean they are great to look at and have super performance numbers, but they are usually made of unobtainium. Even worse, here in North America many of us will never see any of them.
Alfa’s newest offering however may be one of the coolest machines to come out of Italy in decades.
The rest of the story and lots more pics after the break.
