What's Your Favorite Alfa Romeo?
Last week I spent 36 hours in Rome with Bridgestone, which showed off its new Formula E tire and took us on a tour of its European Technical Center. Though I only had a little bit of free time to explore the city, that along with our long bus rides gave me a lot of opportunity to do some Roman carspotting. Man, the Italians really do love their Italian cars, and in particular I saw a lot of really great Alfa Romeos.
There were lots of Alfas from this century running around Rome, but also so many great 1980s and '90s models, plus some that were even older. That got me thinking of my question for today: What's your favorite Alfa Romeo? The company has been around for 116 years, so there are a lot of great ones to choose from. As always, you'll get bonus points if you tell me why you love Alfa so much, especially if there's a personal story to go along with it.
I'm torn between two
For me, there are two standout Alfa Romeos. The first is the Brera, the sporty two-door coupe-hatchback-thing that was launched in 2005 after being previewed by a showstopping concept a few years before. Though it was available with a sonorous V6 engine, a manual transmission and all-wheel drive, the Brera wasn't quite as dynamically excellent as its German competitors, but that doesn't matter. I mean, just look at it! It's a spectacular design that still looks fresh and beautiful twenty years on. Every time I see one, I can't help but drool.
Alfa Romeo
I think my favorite Alfa has to be the 8C Competizione, though, pictured at the top of this story. Talk about beautiful — I think the 8C might be the single most gorgeous car made in the last 26 years, and it's probably still on top if you include prior decades as well. Only 829 were produced from 2007 to 2010, 500 of which were the coupe and the rest being the Spider, and they're an exceptionally rare sight in the U.S., despite the largest chunk of the production run (90 cars) being sold here officially. If I drool every time I spot a Brera, the sight of an 8C is full-on trance-inducing.
What about you, dear reader? What's your favorite Alfa Romeo? Let me know in the comments below, and I'll round up my favorite answers later this week.