ICONS

ALFA ROMEO 8C COMPETIZIONE

Words Carlo Brema / Photos Alfa Romeo

As we eviscerated at the time of our visit to the Alfa Romeo Historical Museum in Arese (see number 83), Alfa Romeo has always been characterized by a troubled history, which has seen it overcome blow for blow the numerous economic adversities that have studded a legacy passed under several hands and which seems to have finally found a certain stability during the last decade, with greater attention to the wide wings represented by its customers, on one hand authentic enthusiasts and driving lovers, on the other car users for the most classic home-to-work commute. If the first of the two categories is the one that interests us the most, it shall also be said that you can’t just breathe love and that solely focusing on performance models would be a bit like traveling at 200 per hour straight towards bankruptcy.

First the splendid 4C and then the Giulia and Stelvio Quadrifoglio recalled the glorious past that earned Alfa Romeo the nickname of “cuore sportivo” (sporty heart), but also gave the stimulus useful in placing care and dedication even for the less hardcore variants of the sedan and SUV of the snake from a small town a couple of kilometers from Milan. This sort of turning point, one of the many crossed by the brand, is anything but casual, but above all it must be attributed to one of the most interesting cars ever produced by mankind. It is called 8C Competizione. Unveiled as a concept car at the 2003 Frankfurt Motor Show, the magnum opus by German designer Wolfgang Egger is the ultimate incarnation of instant classic, a pure object destined to awaken dormant emotions and sensations in the soul of those sitting in the driver’s seat and also in those who, looking at it closely, slide their pupils along the sinuous shapes that even after almost twenty years seem to have crystallized it over time.

The 8C Competizione was then produced starting from 2007, in 500 examples with coupe body and two years later – in 2009 – in 329 units as spider, with a canvas folding roof. The coupe is undoubtedly the softer in lines, taking advantage of the presence of a curved rear window that wraps around the small luggage compartment located behind the two seats. What makes the 8C great, however, is its humanization, a process triggered by an aspect that takes up the stylistic features of the brand and distorts them by developing everything on a car body that, considered in detail, is not at all harmonious, but which creates an overall design blended with what the car itself represents, that is the purest emotional involvement of the driver.

In this regard, they made use of extensive use of carbon fiber, thus topping the scale at just over a ton and a half (1,585 kg to be precise), fitting a 4.7 cc Maserati V8 that barks its 450 horses at 7,000 rpm, but instead of releasing spaceship-like performance, it wears the shoes of a grand tourer with a tender heart, the one focused on enhancing every single moment of the journey, from the first moment in which the roar emitted by the tailpipes assails the eardrums and incites to pinch the red line as if you were a cat chasing the mouse. The gearbox, located at the rear in perfect Alfa Romeo style, is a 6-speed sequential robotized transmission and is nothing science fictional fast or precise, but even in this case where some see a defect, one ends up appreciating that humanity offered by tiny and never rounded corners. The self-locking differential tries in every way to raise the dynamic factor, but the steering is not made to be thrown from one corner to another with a knife between the teeth, the 8C Competizione is not interested in numbers, but facts, indeed emotions.

In its perfect imperfection there is a constant explosion of sensations that despite an impressive 0-100 kph in just 4 seconds and a top speed declared in 306 per hour, puts pure speed and destination in the background, emphasizing what it is capable to give between departure and arrival. Furthermore, the 8C is not only sumptuous in its exterior design, but also offers a cockpit that winks at a classic style, with wonderful leather seats (its skeleton is in carbon fiber as well) that flawlessly integrate with a modern dashboard thanks god without displays and which matches the rounded shapes of the instrumentation located right above a handful of buttons, the radio and the central tunnel with the ones for selecting the gears, entirely covered in carbon fiber.

When it comes to emotions on wheels, one of the first names that comes to mind is that of the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione, which borrows the involvement guaranteed by its cousin Maserati GranTurismo and adapts it for an even more exclusive and full of history evening dress. Simply hearing the sound of its 8-cylinder is a unique, visceral, absurd emotion, but driving is the only way to understand the magic of this model that has started a new chapter in the history of the brand. Initially out for around € 170,000, the 8C has almost doubled its value, mainly due to the fact that being a limited production model it has become prey of collectors, but reality is that it is not a simple dream car, rather an almost sentient tool, who knows very well which keys to tickle in order to show its human nature, the same that makes it imperfectly perfect, the ideal car to fall in love with Arese’s biting snake again.