Fifty and Looking Good

A miscellany of cars first registered in 1971 and photographed this summer.  They're wearing well, looking better than ever and with no need of fillers or botox - just some regular exercise and a drop of STP every now and again.

Porsche 911S

Lotus Elan Sprint

Alfa Romeo Giulia Super

Posrche 911T

Dino 246 GT

Alfa Romeo Spider 1750

Fiat 850 Sport

Maserati Ghibli SS

Jo's Last Season

This month it is fifty years since Jo Siffert died at a meeting I'd been really enjoying, since I was also a fan of Jackie Stewart.  For this to happen at an event held to celebrate JYS's second World Championship at the circuit where Seppi had won his first Grand Prix was especially poignant. But whilst the year 1971 will always bring to mind Jo's death - along with that of fellow Porsche 917-great, Pedro Rodriguez –  rather than dwelling on the tragedy, I wanted to establish an upbeat record of his '71 season by writing an account of the forty one races he contested that year prior to the Brands Hatch 'Victory' meeting.  Here, too, is a selection of images from '71, and for several of these I'd like to record my thanks to Michael Keyser.

January: Daytona  Courtesy autosportsltd.com

April: With Simone at Oulton  Courtesy Getty Images

May: Monaco  Courtesy autosportsltd.com

June: Zandvoort  Courtesy autosportsltd.com  

August: Osterreichring  Courtesy David Phipps/Sutton Images   

October: Edmonton  (Photographer/copyright unknown)

Brands Hatch Italian Festival, 2021

Good to have this event back. Perhaps because of the restrictions of the last 18 months, the turn out - both in terms of cars on display and visitors - seemed better than seen in the last two years.

No Junior Zs this time, but appetite for Zagato was satisfied by a few Alfa ES30 SZs and two Lancia Fulvia Sports:

Sixties Abarths are today looking ever more charismatic and desirable, for instance:

And on-track, there were plenty of Alfas from 'my era:' 

When Two Cylinders Were Enough

 

One of the few '60s/'70s BMW models I never got to drive when I worked for the UK importer 45 years ago was the 700.  I could kick myself now, as I’m sure I had the opportunity a time or two, but with youthful arrogance was too preoccupied with getting behind the wheel of such glamorous things as the 3.0CSL and the 2002 Turbo.  At that time I was still running for fun my Saab 96 Two Stroke, an early influencer in my now lifelong liking for small, stubby cars.  More like an addiction actually, and one fed just the other day by the sight and sounds of this characterful 700 Coupe at Lydden – see above.  It looked superb out on the circuit and was quick enough for a 950cc, 62 year old car, qualifying 7^th (of 15) for the Jack Sears Trophy despite being the only car with a sub-1 litre engine.  And the noise it made whilst doing this was great – gruff and quite coarse, just as I like, and entirely befitting a twin cylinder, air cooled unit.  Such small, ‘unusual’ engines are very appealing in all senses, and can give rise to aesthetically pleasing gems such as this cutaway:

Styled by Michelotti, the 700 was much more successful than its predecessor, the 600, (bubblecar style, but with 4 wheels).  Sales were sufficiently strong to induce the investment from the Quandt family which laid the foundation for BMW’s remarkable growth through the seventies and eighties. 

These are views of the car whilst in its previous ownership, (photography by Bobby Peters and Drew Gibson):

Mirror, Mirror, on the Door

In 1979 I was in my eighth year at BMW Concessionaires GB, still revelling in driving the Bavarian cars, especially the 2002 Tii and 3.0CSLs. When I had started at the UK national base on the Chiswick High Road, not that many people, especially outside London, even knew what B M W stood for, let alone had driven one. On my first visit to the Munich factory, a senior executive, talking about the marque’s future, said that there was an aspiration to design and build cars with the character and performance of those built in Arese; (Mercedes were dismissed as being ‘old men’s’ cars). By ‘79, most people were well aware of BMW, and many longed to own one, so successful had the marketing been throughout the decade. And with sales ever-growing, by 1979 the UK operation was to be reconfigured as a factory-subsidiary company with a brand new, purpose-built headquarters in Bracknell. How fortunate for me – I happened to live just a few miles away and had been getting increasingly fed-up with the daily commute from there into West London. But when I was a boy, one of my most favourite possessions was my copy of The Dumpy Pocket Book of Cars and Commercial Vehicles. The most thumbed pages of that little volume were the two showing and describing the products of Alfa Romeo. I was especially intrigued by the Giulietta variants, though how I pronounced that model name in my head was far from what an Italian would be expecting. That Sprint Speciale model! It made a huge impression on me, the trigger for a lifelong devotion to the Milanese make. So, when I received an invitation to join Alfa’s UK operation, I didn’t hesitate. Industry friends and acquaintances, especially the several whose ambition was to work for BMW, thought I was completely barmy. After the first week of my new commute – now into Edgware Road and through even more congested roads – I began to wonder if they were right.

But, in fact, my sanity was well protected – right from Day-1 I found myself elated by the cars to which I now had access, not least my personal allocated Alfasud 1.5Ti. With the windows down, and revving up to the red-line, the rasping note of that car’s exhaust was nothing less than life-affirming. And for the next 13 years I saw and drove a great many Alfas, in England and in Italy. Nothing unexpected if I say that the Sprint Veloce, Alfetta GTV6, Alfa 75 3.0 and SZ were particularly intoxicating, both to drive and ogle. Though already rare by the time of my joining, I also adored the Junior Z, Giulia GTV and Montreal. In an all-time Alfa beauty parade you would have to add to these the Alfa 33 Stradale, TZ1 and Sprint Speciale. But, for me, the most perfect of them all is the Giulietta Sprint Zagato.

The Giulietta model had debuted in ’54 in Sprint form. Styled at Bertone by Scaglione, the Alfa Sprint Veloce was both good-looking and also competitive on the race track. In ’56 a driver badly damaged his racing Sprint Veloce and decided to ask Zagato to restore it as a ‘one-off’ rather than just rebuild it. The result was a car looking quite similar to the SV, but with body panels in aluminium.

1958 Giulietta SVZ – Courtesy of Sotheby’s

Both the owner and Zagato liked the result, the Carrozzeria enough to decide to use it as the basis for a new model, the SVZ.  Between ’56 and ’59, Zagato built (as conversions of Sprint Veloces) 16, (some say 18), SVZs.  The good reception of the model spurred Alfa Romeo to the decision to commission Zagato to series-produce the SZ.  Envisioning a good level of demand and more substantial sales, it was agreed that instead of having to dismantle a Sprint Veloce as the basis for each car, the factory would supply just the basic chassis platform to Zagato. 

This post is primarily intended as an introduction to the Giulietta SZ for those not already familiar with it.  It is not an exhaustive history or explanation of the model.  For that purpose there is nothing better than Marcello Minerbi’s superb book, Alfa Romeo-Zagato SZ TZ, (1985 La Mille Miglia Editrice).  Some of the information and images reproduced here stem from that source, (marked ^MM).

The SZ was first shown to the public at the Geneva Motor Show in March ‘60.  It would continue in production until ’63.  204 examples were built, of which 30, at the end of the run, featured a revised body shape with a ‘chopped’ tail – these are referred to as the ‘Coda Tronca’ version and to my eye this design is less harmonious.  The initial version has a rounded rear section, ‘Coda Tonda,’ and it is this that I say is the most beautiful Alfa of them all! 

In May 2019 Sotheby’s sold a set of original Zagato blueprints which included this of the SZ Coda Tonda:

These photographs^MM show an SZ under construction in the Zagato works on Via Giorgini, just a little further North West from Milan than Alfa Romeo’s factory at Portello:

This is an Alfa Romeo Press Photograph of the SZ on launch:

The Giulietta SZ proved to be a very successful car on the track.  Marcello Minerbi lists 55 outright/class wins in significant race events, ’60-’63.  Included were 3 class wins in the Targa Florio and 2 overall victories in the Coupe des Alpes. It was also the winning car in the Italian 1300 GT Championship in ’60, ’62 and ’63.

Recently offered/sold SZs include these gems:

Chassis number 31, by Kidstons

Chassis number 34, by Sotheby’s

Chassis number 37, by Bonhams

Chassis number 43, by Gooding & Co

Chassis number 107, by Bonhams

Chassis number 144 by Howard Wise Cars

Finally, this collage shows that the Giulietta SZ Coda Tonda is one of those (rare) cars that looks absolutely perfect from every angle: