Lancia nowadays doesn't hold a candle to the brand it was until the early 1990s. Before Fiat started to put different bodies and glue Lancia badges on the Panda and Bravo, the legendary Italian manufacturer was a byword for brilliant engineering and gorgeous cars.
An hour of staring at models such as the Aprilia, Fulvia HF or Aurelia B24 convertible seems like a moment to any proper gearhead. Lancia didn't do just beautiful machines. The brand is noted for many automotive firsts such as the first mass-produced V4 and V6 engines, employing supercharging and turbocharging concomitantly on the same engine, the narrow angle V motor with a single block, the first manufacturer to use a monocoque body (on the Lambda), the first mass-produced five-speed manual transmission and the electric boot spoiler.
It's scandalous how Lancia became such a sorry car brand after it gave us so many in its glorious days of old. But most important of all, Lancia still holds the record for the most successful carmaker in rallying. Although it stopped participating in top-level rallying in 1992, Lancia has a whopping 16 World Rally Championship titles under its belt. The cars that did it were the rally-spec Fulvia, the gorgeous Stratos, and the Delta, but many petrolheads tend to forget the 037 was a serious piece of kit in its own way.
It won only one Constructors Chamionship (1983), but it was one hell of a machine. How come? Well, the Lancia 037 is the only rally car that managed to beat the Audi Quattro to the championship. Keep in mind that the Quattro is all-wheel drive, while the 037 is a rear-wheel drive monster. While the Group B-spec 037 was like a ferocious animal thanks to the gazillion horsepower churned from its 2-liter mill, us mortals were given a limited run of Stradale road-going Lancia 037s with about 200 ponies on tap.
This redhead is one of them and the Petrolicious team did a great job with their latest installment of tasteful driving. Before you press play, we recommend to turn the volume all the way up to 11.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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