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Lamborghini Bertone Athon Concept Drives into 2016 Villa d'Este

Only a few days ago, I was telling you how the Concorso d'Eleganza Villa d'Este is one of the best car shows in Europe. Far from the crappy new city cars that come out in Paris or Geneva, this summer even is host only to exotics, both old and new.
Lamborghini Bertone Athon Concept Drives into 2016 Villa d'Este 1 photo
Photo: screenshot from Youtube
Today, we are going to take a quick look at the Athon, a concept car built by Bertone in 1980. It made a surprse appearance at the 2016 edition of Villa d'Este, and we can't get enough of it.

This is how people thought future sports cars would look. It kind of reminds us of the vehicles in two Sylvester Stalone movies, Judge Dredd, and Demolition Man. There is also a distinct hint of the Ferrari Testarossa Spider, both from the front and looking at the engine deck.

That being said, it's not as flashy as some of the current supercars. Most shapes can be defined by simple, straight lines. The Bertone trademark wedged shape is also less pronounced than on their other studies.

Underneath, the car is based on the Lamborghini Urraco P300 and kept its V8 engine. It has a nice rumble, but nowhere near as exotic-sounding as a Huracan.

The concept was never approved for production, with Lamborghini's financial problems of the time being partly to blame. After completing a tour of the car show circuit, the Athon was sent to the Bertone museum.

In 2011, the famous Italian design house announced it was selling most of its prized concepts, this being one of them. The auction took place five years ago at this exact location, and the Athon found a new owner who paid €347,200 at the time.

While that sounds like a lot, the 1967 Lamborghini Marzal prototype, serial number 1001, driven by Prince Ranier and Princess Grace at the start of 1967 Monaco Grand Prix, sold for €1.51 million and the famous Lancia Stratos HF Zero fetched €761,600.

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About the author: Mihnea Radu
Mihnea Radu profile photo

Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida.
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