Lancia Stratos: Original Rally Icon — The Carmudgeon Show Jason Cammisa & Derek Tam-Scott — Ep 178

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Good morning. Good 20-25. Yeah, we missed last week. Happy new year. Happy new year. Happy new year. We were busy last week. Things, you were sourcing lunches, straddles. I went to Michigan. I was home working because I made the mistake slash decision slash fortuitous comment about Chazetta V16T and my phone has been ringing off the hook because everyone has a V16T.

Well, everyone has a story about the man who created that car. Yeah, I actually have given some thought to quitting my job and just writing a screenplay based on this man's life and just doing a two-hour lifetime movie. I don't know how to write this revelation script because there's so much shit that's going to end up on the cutting room floor of the script.

Well, I mean, it's just do I do a two-hour revelations that's an hour and 45 minutes of shitting on this. Not even that. It's just the story of this guy's life. He's nuts, but anyway, so that's where I was over the New Year's break. Yes, it looks like you got some tires for Christmas. Where?

Oh, is that that smell? The non-burning rubber smell. I know it's so usual that it's burning that you don't recognize it when it's not burning, but that isn't smell of rubber.

This entire studio smells like a tire shop. There are a lot of front of science, but they didn't sponsor the episode, so we don't talk about them, but we did get tires. We have a lot of tires to mount. I have an appointment with a tire guy on, say, whatever days, Saturday.

Or appointments and Saturday or Saturday to bring the minivan to this shop to drop off the tires, drop off wheels and tires, and this person has a day cleared. It's mountain balance tires.

Yeah, it's going to be an expensive day, but we will report on their performance.

I will say so far there's one, we're not going to go that much into it. There's a hyper track all seasons now on the golf. And what a difference over five-year-old PSA has three pluses in ride quality and noise.

To be probably good wet performance too. Well, I haven't really done too much in there, but I did slide it right.

I drove spiritedly around a corner and big grip. I thought I was going for drama, and I got no, I got grip instead of drama.

I think we forgot to specify who we are and what this is.

I am the Carmage and Show, and that is Jason Camisa, and that is Derek Tamizka.

And over there is the Lancia Alpha Beta Gamma Stratos.

Stradale. Stradale. Say that 12 times with a lift.

I'd rather not. Do I have to?

Yes.

This episode is about the Lancia Stratos, which Jason has now driven for the first time in his life.

So, we will discuss the development and history and experience contained in the Lancia Stratos, which is one of my very favorite cars.

I think you might have actually said your favorite car you've ever driven.

It's the car of most quantum home.

All right, well, we're done.

Enjoy.

I know.

Physiological state which animals reduce their body temperature, metabolic rate,

and other life processes to conserve energy and survive in unfavorable conditions.

That's pretty much meal winter.

That was the start of this episode you realized.

This is what happens off-screen, guys.

But it's also a state of physical, mental, and activity, lethargy.

Lethargy, I was using.

Lazyitis.

Yes, that's torpor.

Anyway, a torpor you've learned the word of the day.

There were some great feedback on that last episode we talked about.

Whether there had ever been an elegant...

Mid-engine car.

Besides the...

Shirom.

Ormira.

What's the suggestion?

I'll pull out the insta's.

Of course, it reset.

I had that page open.

Some people come, you know, some people say, come on, the 458 is very elegant.

No.

No, I disagree with that.

Lotus is free V8.

No.

It's a little overwrought.

It's curvaceous, which is a typical for modern mid-engine cars.

So, I can see McLaren Speedtail NSX.

288GTO.

GTO is too aggressive.

Maybe Speedtail, because it's so like...

It looks like a speed shape.

You know what the speed shape is?

Is the thing that they put paint on just to...

Then you were like, oh, do I like this color or not?

That's what it looks like.

Yes.

Toyota Previa was a very good one.

That made me laugh.

But it's not elegant.

That is amusing.

XJ220.

Approaching.

Yeah.

Nearly elegant.

Yeah.

Okay.

First gen R8.

No.

Beautiful.

Yeah.

Not elegant.

Maybe Pagani, Spiker.

Not Pagani.

A mirror.

A mirror was one that popped in my head while we were recording that.

A mirror is close.

Yeah.

How about a deep blue A110?

I don't know the color.

I don't know the colors.

They don't make those cars in deep blue.

They're always like bright blue.

I don't know that.

Lestrato stradale.

Not elegant.

I will talk about it.

But it is there.

Thing in the background in a second.

McLaren GT, Ferrari 430 Pagani Speedtel.

Ferrari Dino didn't make the cut,

and that was the one where I was like, oh.

Oh, yeah, we screwed that up.

Yeah, the 246 Dino is elegant.

Yeah, I agree.

Diablo, no, that one F1, no.

MC20, no.

It just has, it's just long.

The 33 is not elegant, it's just long.

33 straight-leaf.

So that I, it's pretty aggressive.

It's so muscular that it makes it hard to be elegant,

but it is nearly, yes, okay, maybe a bit.

Maybe.

Elise.

God, no.

It's like a mosquito.

Yeah, an alien.

Not elegant.

Somebody, NSX, Ford GT, Carrera GT, first R8,

McLaren F1, Mid-Engine, Ferrari's aren't elegant.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Those are all wrong.

König's egg, the Jamera.

No, just because it's a blobby,

it doesn't mean it's elegant.

Cayman N220, no.

987 Cayman, Vera, no.

We discussed that one.

We did.

P1, I think we're through most of them.

Pagani, P30, not elegant.

People don't know what elegant is.

That's why it's not a thing.

Well, why don't you tell them what elegant is?

T50, M1.

T50 is not.

M1 is not.

It's too wedgy.

A lot of XH220s.

But I think they'll...

Yeah, XH220, I can see.

I could see.

In the same way that speed, McLaren's speed dial.

Yeah, long and curvaceous.

There's a lot of T33, T50.

I don't think the T50 is.

296 is pretty close.

Well...

As modern cars go, yeah.

Oh, I like this one.

Agree with Jason, but disagree with Derek.

You're not going to add anymore.

This person listed all the same stuff

that we've just discussed.

A Vera, a Mira and Noble.

No, I think the one that we really screwed up on was 246, you know.

Yes, I agree.

Yeah, that one is Zonda.

No.

It's anyone for a rot.

Quattroce, forci.

No.

Too stumpy.

Yeah, like this.

Like that.

Okay.

Anyway, that's done happen.

This is the first episode of the year.

It is.

Happy new year, but it feels a lot like the last one

because I brought something for show and tell again

and made you drive it.

Yeah, that sucked.

You know, sorry.

The only thing is I was, as I was on my way here,

I was on the phone with Anthony Esposito

and he's like, ah, what are you doing?

I'm like, well, Derek, we're going to record Carmage in

and Derek is bringing a Lange Stratos.

Yes.

Well, I told you you should drive one.

Yeah.

Said, bring me one.

So I did.

I did things in my pants I'm not supposed to.

And yeah, and he's like, oh, that's awesome.

I'm like, it's awesome, except it's like drizzling.

Everything is covered in moss

because it's been wet for five days.

Yeah.

And it's like 49 degrees.

Yeah.

And Anthony's response is probably weather.

Yeah, I'm like, yeah, that's because it's not your

multiple, multiple, multiple, multiple,

multiple hundreds of thousands of dollar car.

So that was, it's here.

Yes.

You got it back.

Yeah.

Mostly, I mean, I think I probably wore some components

a little bit.

Such as the nature of driving.

Not the tires given that we were on moss.

Yes.

Some of them.

So dream car, obviously.

Yes, where do we want to start?

Should we start with your driving impressions?

That seems to be where we're going.

What's, or do we want the history of the Stratos driving

impressions for?

OK.

Just because I started and I have something bubbling up.

Yes, yes, you need to get out.

This car shares the powertrain with the Ferrari 246 Dino.

Only elegant engine car.

That was a fail to imagine.

That was the one we forgot about.

I think I might.

I need to drive them together.

But I think I actually might prefer to drive the 246 Dino

to this.

And at price parity, because they're similarly valuable.

I don't know if I really want to say these words,

but I might perhaps could prefer the 246 Dino to the Stratos.

You are 100% wrong.

You heard it here first.

OK, there is no firewall.

There is a small piece of fiberglass

that pretends to be a firewall.

So you're in the engine compartment with the engine.

And when I say this is a V6, that makes no bad sounds ever.

I'm not lying.

Everything, every noise it makes is wonderful.

So I like that.

Love the noise.

Like the power a lot.

It's enough.

It's not overwhelming.

I don't.

The car weighs 2,100 pounds and has 190 horsepower.

So it's about like at least.

US is at least.

It doesn't feel that fast.

But then again, it's so violent, noise-wise.

I think the Dino is better steering, better shifter.

It rides better.

I don't know if it would handle nearly as well.

I just felt like the Dino is easier to operate

and was so close to the experience level of this car

in terms of not the volume, but the quality of sound.

You're going to kick me out of the table.

I think experience level they don't compare.

I think this is a 9.4.

I think the chassis of the car, the cars

feel completely different in the chassis department.

And that, to me, is really where the strato sings.

And where the Dino is good, but not amazing.

Dino, OK.

This car, I think, you could go flat out on back roads

and never, like, I never once thought about a pothole.

Or like, am I going to scrape anything?

Or, you know, it feels like it's tough.

And it just doesn't care about bumps.

And I didn't really push the Dino all that hard.

But there was a lightness and delicacy to the Dino

with everything, all the controls.

The shifter was super light, the throttle was light,

the clutch was light.

Everything's heavy on this car, except for the steering.

Except for the steering.

But the Dinos was talkative on center.

And it just was quick to respond off center.

And this very much feels like the Lancia 037 that I drove,

which was sort of almost zero effort

until you get a lot of lock on.

And so in that sort of on center where you're driving

most of the time when you're not on twisty road,

it's kind of dead.

It's just not talking to you.

And then in the corners, this diff is nuts.

I mean, it feels like a locking rear diff in that.

As soon as you're on throttle, it's pushing the front end.

It's understeering.

And as second, you go from throttle to overrun.

The car tucks in in turns, which tells me

that it's just a really aggressive locking diff.

And that's fun.

But I feel like the Dino turned just as well

without scaring the shit out of me.

I don't know.

Tell me what you think.

To me, there are 83,644 ways to drive a Stratos.

And I think there's 13 or 14 ways to drive a Dino.

The Stratos to me has so much more adjustability

and depth of character than the Dino.

The Dino is a car that I feel.

It's like the 308 Dino, right?

I don't want to drive that car above 8,8 and a half

tenths.

And I think you didn't get to meet

the best part of the Stratos today

on account of the conditions.

And the best part of the Stratos

is when you're just absolutely hauling ass in it

because it becomes so alive and pissed.

We started to talk about this in the car,

and then we tried to stop ourselves

from discussing anything in the car

so that we can sort of get unvarnished opinions,

uncoalesced opinions when we're recording.

And what you said, let me see.

You were saying something about the car is very much alive,

but it wants you to be dead.

And that is my favorite part of the Stratos.

And on a dry, really tight, twisty road,

it is just absolutely transcendent.

I've never experienced any car that does what this car does.

It is so like adjustable.

It's like everything that you get in a 911, but just more so.

I agree the shifter is not very good.

They seem to be like that.

The other thing is that these cars have different carburetors

from 246s, or maybe it's the linkage

or the way that the throttle is arranged,

but they have kind of heavy throttle tipping.

And the brakes are heavy because they're

meant to be used with your left leg because it's a rally car.

The car just has this really outrageous aliveness

to it that I have never experienced in any other car, maybe

in 911, but the limit behavior of this car

is just endlessly entertaining and terrifying in a way

that I can't compare it to anything else.

I mean, I didn't exactly get into that museum piece,

Tino, and drifted up the hill.

And I didn't actually mean to be sliding in this

the first four or five times that we did little anybody slides.

It was perfectly controllable, but they weren't.

I didn't ask for that.

And I think maybe that was what set me like right down

to like, all right, it's somebody else's car.

I don't want to damage this.

And the conditions were genuinely terrible.

I mean, good enough visibility when it wasn't super foggy,

but just the roads were slick.

And that has, you said they're one year old Michel

and XWX is on it.

The way they let go, they don't give you any warning, right?

So not in these conditions.

Well, not in these conditions and not in this car, right?

The steering's kind of dead.

And so there were times where I'm like,

is the back end coming?

Yes, I believe it is.

And it wasn't like what I'm looking for in a car

with great steering is, you'll sort of load up in a corner

as if the back starts to get close to walking.

You'll have a negative torque or a relaxation

in the waiting of the steering.

That tells you the car is so light steering in on-center.

It's just nothing.

This is off-center, this is even in the corner.

You're just sort of like, I think, oh, yep, I'm sideways.

Yes.

I love the lack of communication for that.

I also didn't love that on this car.

And you said there, I've never done another one.

That the throttle's heavy, but it's more so than that.

There's almost like a gate that you have to push through first.

And once you're through that section of the throttle,

through that section, then it's all linear and fine.

And this car carburet's beautiful.

You can give it.

You can crack the throttle and not even a stumble

on a lot of carburetors.

You have to slam it open, as opposed to progressively.

And so you can kind of slam right through the gate,

so to speak, and it's totally fine,

but between that diff and how aggressive it is

and how differently the car behaves on and off the throttle

and how short the wheelbase is

and how, you know, relaxed, we'll call it

non-communicative, the steering wheel is.

The steering is, I didn't feel comfortable.

And every time I tried to just squeeze a little throttle in,

I kind of got nothing, nothing, nothing.

And more than I asked for, and that would lock the diff,

send me for a little correction,

and just made it so that I was scared to push it.

With that said, the last thing we did,

once I survived the mountain,

was coming to an industrial park here where

there was no one around and we closed the roads.

And I just sort of honed it around at 25 and 30 miles an hour

and it was amazing.

Like, I cannot believe the amount of grip

coming from those areas.

You cannot break it loose in first gear,

even around a 90-degree right bend at 3,000 RPM

where you just, in first gear, it was a riot.

I mean, it was just the noise is,

you have to drive one hard on a dry road

because it is such a, I don't have really words.

I tried my best in the video that I did

to put into words what this is,

but, you know, there have been many things

written about this car that it is mental

but it wants to kill you that it,

you need to have be professional grade driver

with professional grade reflexes

because it is a professional grade piece of equipment.

I stand by all of that.

Even the professional drivers who drove it,

Sandra Minare won the World Rally Championship

in this car, more than once.

And he said, no matter how fast you went on a stage,

you always felt like the car could have gone faster

if you had the skill to do it.

We got.

Even though he's one of the best drivers in the world.

And that's, I think there's something magical

about chasing mastery of this car

because it is so sort of unhinged.

Unhinged, yeah, responsive.

I mean, one of the other things I said

is this car responds to throttle input,

steering input, braking input,

sometimes no input.

It's just, it's really out there.

It's really, you're not entirely sure.

And then it goes around the same corner

differently each time you do it.

Like, I think that chasing mastery of this car

is amazingly intoxicating.

The way also that the front end,

it is inclined to understeer a lot

if you don't know how to get it to not understeer

and getting that sort of technique down

and getting it to get the front end to bite is really magical.

My co-founder, Taz, who was a professional driver,

said, what do you have to do with this car?

You have to drive it on the nose.

You have to drive it hard.

You have to drive it on those, which means

you need to load up the front tires,

which means you need to be doing stuff.

You need to be trail-breaking

or really aggressively chopped throttle

to get the front end to load up.

And then it'll, you know, so the technique

for driving this car is very different

from driving those cars.

It's a pretty advanced technique

to get this car to do what you want.

It's incredibly-

And that's very different from the Dino, right?

Yes, the Dino is just-

That's why I said there's 14 ways to drive a Dino

and there's 44,000 ways to drive this car.

You know, I think if it didn't cost what it cost

and if it had some sort of semblance of crash protection

and whatever, and it was a dry road

and that was tighter, I think, I think.

And listening to what you're saying,

I think I would probably feel the same way as you do.

I love cars that are that don't want to be tamed.

That are just sort of unhinged.

Do you know that I hate more, you know, most,

I don't like most 911s that are sorted

because I want them to be-

Yes.

I would say adjustable, yes.

Adjustable, this is so adjustable.

Like maybe like a fault even.

Well, we were on the freeway

and we were just on of the slightest little bank

of a turn at, I don't know, 75 miles an hour

and I just had to get off the throttle for a split second

and then back on and it tightens its line at 0.03 G.

I mean, you're not even rounding a corner

and you still feel that diff very clearly.

I think it's like chassis setup also, I'm sure.

Whatever it is, whatever combination of things it is,

it's, I mean, you are well aware

that this thing is ready to turn at all times

which is incongruous with the steering

because the steering doesn't feel you can sort of do this.

You sort of get 10 or 15 degrees of play

where it just kind of doesn't wait up at all

and nothing kind of happens.

Yeah, it all sort of notionally sort of

adjust in that direction.

It's direction.

But then after that, it's just so quick to turn in.

Yeah.

I mean, yeah, because then it's the chassis

that's turning instead of just the slight steering input.

There's something very unusual about the feel

of the steering of the straddles.

I could, you know, with ear plugs in and blindfolded,

I could back a straddles out of a parking spot

and I could tell you that it was a straddles

that I was driving just by the feel of the steering.

It's not like any other car.

I drove that 0.037 once.

So I don't remember that characteristic of it.

That car was kind of an assault

and so I think my attention was consumed by other things

because it's super charged.

I will not be surprised to learn

that this is the same front suspension and steering

as that car is.

To me, that was the only car that I've ever driven

that was, the steering was so light

that I genuinely would have thought it was power assisted

because it was so light.

And so I don't want to say devoid of feel

because once you're in corners, you feel everything.

But on the straightaway, it just feels disconnected and aloof

and that other launcher was exactly the same way.

And then, you know, when you're hauling ass,

it's a very different story.

Let me also say, no insult to this to say

that I couldn't, or I'd have a hard time deciding between

in 246 because the 246 is my favorite Ferrari ever.

So it's not what I would choose this hands down.

I think because of its specialness

in terms of how much louder it is,

how much more sorted in 246 is like the car

that I would want to drive to a grocery store

and that would make driving to your friend's house for dinner

a fucking experience.

This one wants the back road.

And so if you're going out for a back road blast,

this is for sure the one I would take.

But if I was just like, well, I have a Ferrari

that I'm using in lieu of a Miata, right?

I'm just, you know, I'm gonna take it to work.

I'm gonna take it to dinner and that,

that's where 246 becomes appealing.

Plus, I think it's gorgeous.

That having been said, this car has very strange

characteristics about it that are very practical

that you would not expect.

Huge trunk.

Like it's got a gigantic trunk.

It's got a lot of ground clearance.

The wheelbase also and the ride height

and the fact that, you know, the nose and the tail

are both upturned because you're meant to be sliding

by roadside boulders and not catch them.

And so you can fly in and out of driveways

and across potholes and everything in a way

that doesn't feel right for a mid-engine sort of car.

That is true.

And so it has this weird like hot hatchiness to it

that you can approach anything at any speed

without slowing down, which is quite special.

That is really cool.

And that's something we barely touched on

because of the conditions.

I just wasn't willing to go that fast.

But there was one section of the road where I commented

that a friend of ours had to really slow down.

And this is probably a 55 section of road

that I was maybe doing 60 in in this car.

And I remarked at the time,

a friend of ours in his 360 had to

whoa, way down to like 30 miles an hour

because of the bumps and jumps and undulations,

whatever the thing.

And then because it's so stiffly sprung,

you feel like you don't have good grip

or like you're not in contact with the road a lot of times.

It's a very tortuous section of road.

And so when you're in it's really stiffly sprung car

without any ground clearance,

it's just like, you don't feel like you're driving on the road.

You feel like you're over it.

Yeah.

Well, and you're ripping off bumpers and spoilers.

Yes, so in this car didn't care at all.

So no, I would deal for that mission.

I would love to do a hill climb or something

in this thing.

The traction is unbelievable at the rear.

Like that's, again, I think a lot of it comes down to that.

I want to know what if that's a 45% locker or something.

It's crazy.

Well, I don't actually, allegedly,

it's the same as a 246.

I don't know if that's actually true or not.

But I mean, again, I don't remember really pushing

that 246 all that hard up the hill.

But I think it was on like 20 or 30 year old tires.

Yeah.

No, you swapped your wheels on it.

That's why my wheels on it, that's right.

Yeah.

Because it was on 30 year old tires, that's why.

But I don't think I slid around anything.

But you saw lots of time in your 308.

And the 308 and the 246 feel fairly similar to me.

That's a 308's diff is no joke.

I mean, it's one of the few mid-engine cars

that I can power slide around a corner in second gear,

power oversteer around a corner comfortably.

And I think part of it is that diff is so.

But it has a long wheelbase, which helps sort of damp things

down, and this car has the exact opposite situation.

This car is 146 inches long, which makes it, let's see,

20, 3 inches shorter than a 9.11.

It's two feet shorter than a 9.11, and an air-cooled 9.11,

which is a small car.

I mean, this thing is really properly tiny.

And people, I don't think remember how little those are.

It's two feet shorter than a golf.

Yeah.

It's just a little car.

So yeah, I mean, it's a recipe for instability.

This is something that I've talked about before

that the car is engineered to be unstable in the same way

that fighter planes are engineered to be unstable

so that they're extra maneuverable.

And so the car doesn't want to do anything that's not,

it doesn't, this car has no equilibrium.

It's always, the only contradiction to that

is the understeer under power.

And that's from the diff.

But you have to get it turned on the way into a corner

and then just push on the way out.

Yeah, I mean, ideally, you would be sliding out.

You'd be power sliding out.

And if you could power slide it out.

Then you don't have any issue with understeering.

I would love to play with this car like that.

I would love this on a race track, like a bumpy racetrack.

Somebody needs to do like a rally style bumpy racetrack.

Maybe you need a co-cart track.

Yeah, so this car is not, so a number of people

have asked me how does it compare to the green one I drove

because I have to imagine with all the adjustability

that this car has.

So the chassis is extremely adjustable.

It's got struts in the back and then

double wishbones in the front, more or less.

And you have adjustable sway bars, both the end holes

and the length of the end links, and adjustable ride height.

And I'm sure everything else is adjustable too.

And this was designed into the car.

So we can start transition to the history lesson on this car.

It is more or less, no.

It is unequivocally the first car that

was designed specifically to go rallying.

Every time before that that people had gone rallying,

it was in a choose car mini or a lot of Fulvia or Citroen

DS or Jaguars or Porsche.

They were all designed to do something else.

And then people were like, oh, let's use this to go rallying.

And this car was designed from the ground up to go rallying.

And so there's a whole bunch of stuff

in it like the adjustability of the suspension

that was designed in so that it could be good to go rallying.

The same thing, the front and rear clips are super easy

to take on and off.

So that after you damage it, you can place it very quickly

on the side of the road.

The rear cross member is bolted in.

So that you can remove it.

So you can pull the engine and transmission out in one go

and then replace it quickly on the side of the road.

There's all the turrets that are really beefy

in the central chassis, which is really substantial,

was designed that wave with rallying in mind.

Because the car was to replace

the previous rally car, which was the front-wheel drive

Fulvia, which was not designed as a rally car.

And there's a bunch of different categories of rallies.

The really aggressive rough ones are the ones

where the launches and most cars would suffer

because they weren't durable enough.

You push a shock through the fender liner

or through the tower because it was coming down

on stuff so hard.

So the Acropolis rally is famous for that grease

and the East African Safari rally in Kenya also.

And so this car was designed to be strong enough

to survive all of that.

And so the structure is super robust

and beefy looking when you are looking at it for that reason.

So the bottom line of all that was that there's,

I imagine, every strata drives differently

because there's so much adjustability.

But this one has the same sort of fundamental character

that the green one that I made the video about does,

which is that it's sort of would like you to not be alive

if possible.

But the motor in this car is not like the one

and the other one of the group four motor

and the other car apparently.

So it had a lot more power.

It's a lot zippier, the throttle is a lot heavier still.

So this car is actually easier to drive than that one.

And that one was a lot louder.

The exhaust was louder and it had no air box.

So it was just velocity stacks.

I mean, this one I floored it in a tunnel

and there was no difference.

It was just you're deafened all the time

by being in the engine compartment effectively with the car.

That's kind of funny because even relatively quiet cars

in this one particular tunnel, you know,

you get that reverb, nothing.

I'm like, OK, well, so everything

we hear is on the inside of the car, which I kind of also like.

Yes, it's a car that, you know, all of the good stuff

is for you.

The mirror is like this too.

The mirror is loud outside, but it's

deafening inside and this car is very similar

that the best part of the engine experiencing

is for the occupants of the car.

So yeah, it's really something.

And then the car was, you know, like all homologation cars.

We have the stradale, which means strada means street.

So of the street stradale.

The stradale version of this car

exists because it needed to be made

in order for it to be homologated to race in group four.

I think a really important distinction.

There's the idea of a race car for the road, right?

And so you have so many things like Ferrari challenge stradale,

which is kind of a joke, is that you have the,

like, for example, a 360, which is a street car,

turned into a race car, a 360 challenge,

turned back into a street car, a challenge stradale.

And so, but, you know, even cars like Mercedes-Cars

are worth 190, all those cars that are E30M3's,

homologation cars are based on a regular production car

that has all of the compromises baked in for comfort,

for, you know, longevity and-

Car that eats a cell millions of units to regular old people.

You know, that are driven in the winter

so they have heaters and they have just stuff like that.

This is not that.

This is 100% a race car.

That was, they made just enough changes to allow it

to be driven on the road.

Yes.

And that's the difference between, you say, you know,

group B and group A, because group A has

a 5,000 unit homologation.

And so that necessarily is going to be a car

like a 190-cause worth or a Delta integral A.

That's derived from a thing that's meant for street use.

Right, where they make 5,000 versions,

a special version of that car like this.

Yes, and that's the cause worth or the M3,

the 190-cause worth or the M3 or the integral A

versus a regular Delta or whatever.

And then group B, the unit, the requirement was 200 units

and then group four and group five preceded, you know,

group ABC, which came out 1982.

And so this car ran in group four

so the homologation requirement was 500

and then later they changed it to 400 units.

And so the, what you need to,

what the public is willing to accept in a car,

if you're selling two or four or 500 units

is very different from what the public is willing to accept

when you sell 5,000 units.

And if I remember correctly,

launch out a hard time selling these, right?

Correct. So they needed to make 500 of them.

They ultimately made, the numbers generally

agreed to be between 492 and 498 units.

Wow.

And new Stratos' sat around, unsold for years

after production ended

and they just needed to make them, they need to sell them.

And so I think it was Road and Track article

about this car that has one of my very favorite quotes

was that they produced the production,

the road-going version of this car

with little enthusiasm and it sold with less success

because they did it because they had to.

And that is sort of clear when you interact

with parts of the car, I mean, it's like,

it's pretty casual in terms of like the fiberglass,

like you open the clamshells and you look at the inside

of them and you're like, man, this is pretty crude

and like the sort of general creature comforts

and like the way that the windows work and everything.

So the windows are hinged single pivot hinge at the back.

Yes.

Yes, so the front of it drops down.

Drops down, but the back, there's a single point

at the back where it remains fixed.

But without a crank, so I mean,

hopefully we've got a video of this we can insert.

You basically, for those listening,

you basically loosen a nut and just drop that nut down

a slider and the window just pivots down in the front

and then you can lock it just in the front

so the back, so the opening's not big enough

to bike, to buy big Macs through.

There's certainly no air conditioning.

I think there might be heat, but there is heat.

Yes.

It's inexplicable in its function.

There is a little slider that goes from thunder, right?

Well, we had the heater core valve was closed.

That's why there was no heat present.

Yeah, but there were two other levers.

Oh, yes, I don't know what those do.

Yeah, we don't know.

That's the point.

What was the price point of this car when it was not?

Interesting question.

Where would you guess?

I'm guessing more than two percent.

Here are your cars that you have to choose from.

There's like alpha Montreal.

So luxury GT with a V8 in it.

Porsche 911.

Squish beetle with a spot six in it.

The and then the Ferrari 308 GT4

and the or the late 246 and the Lamborghini Euraco.

Okay.

So all of the cars are, no, actually,

I'm not gonna give any further hints.

So I'm guessing, let me guess that the 308 and the 246

were between 22 and $25,000 at the time.

Right, somewhere in there?

Sure.

911 would have been 18, 17,

Euraco would have been 21.

So some were there all in that area

and this would be 35.

Is this total guess?

Okay, so this car cost about the same as an alpha Montreal.

It cost less than the 911 Euraco

or the Ferrari Dino.

Less, less.

Well, there's less to it.

I mean, but it's one of 400.

That's not what happened.

The brake is, they're doing cost-based pricing,

not value-based pricing.

Well, that's what I mean,

but cost-based, like, this is not a well-finished,

like thing that look quite was cheap.

Yeah, I would have thought it would be it well,

but I would think it would be expensive

because it's not the volume.

Because volume, you start to make up that price.

Yes, yes.

So the car was less than a 246.

Yes.

Yeah, new than I would be having this

for sure for less than 246.

Yeah.

But I guess no one knows how.

Well, I mean, those cars had air conditioning

and power windows and back seats

and, like, linings on the inside of the trunk lid

and the engine lid and bought by doctors.

Yeah, they were like really refined luxurious cars

and this was a, like, you know, it's really paired back.

This thing doesn't even have window regulators.

Literally no window regulators.

No firewall.

I mean, the firewall is a sheet of fiberglass.

Like, you can literally, as you were doing,

push on the firewall

and look at it from the other side

from the engine department and see it flexing

as you push on it between the seats.

I guess, I mean, when you start thinking about it,

so it was 9, 11-ish money.

Yes.

So you're talking in today's money,

120 grand for a toy, 100, something thousand.

Yeah, except for that's incorporating inflation.

I mean, back then, if you do the math,

it's probably like $63,000 or something like that.

Yeah, but I'm just saying, like,

if something came out of the equivalent of this today, right?

And you say, well, it's, you know,

it's about the same prices in 9, 11,

or about the same prices of what?

The problem is that for the cheapest for our ease,

fucking three and a grand at this point.

Yes.

But the idea of spending six figures on a toy,

versus six figures on something that is an experience,

but you can daily it.

Yeah.

You see why it's a tough sell.

I could daily this car.

You don't live in Los Angeles

or somewhere that you need air conditioning.

Yep, that's true.

You, but I mean, as an old car,

I would be happy to daily this car

as with the expectations you have for an old car.

Like, I think it's quite easy to drive.

You can fly over stuff.

It rides comfortably.

It's small.

The visibility is reasonable.

It's not bad.

Considering its shape, you can actually see fairly well

out of it.

Yeah.

Yeah, I just think, I think most people

and in this sort of super car world

are kind of douchebag buyers

and they're like, they want show off

and ability and luxury.

Yes.

That brings us to the public's response to this car.

I've driven around for maybe three or four days

at this point and nobody knows what it is.

I took it to cars and coffee

and people knew what it was there, of course,

but just driving around and public,

nobody has any idea what it is.

I assume they think it's a kid car.

You know, I had one guy who was walking by the gas station

while I was buying fuel who walked away

from the sidewalk into the gas station

to the front of the car.

He's a generation Z.

So he didn't, of course, talk to me

or acknowledge my existence or anything like that.

But he did walk up to it, read what it said

on the front of it, you know, left equally confused,

got no value out of reading.

Well, most I think most of you

don't know what a launch is.

Nobody knows what a, yeah, what a launch is,

but normally like, if you were to pronounce it that way.

Yeah, but if you, if I was driving like a 308 GT4

that had Ferrari badges on when they walk up to it

and read, or this happens with the Miura, right?

Nobody knows what the Miura is if they're not a car person,

but they walk up and see that it says Lamborghini

and then you see a light bulb go on

and then they leave satisfied with discovery

having occurred and understanding being achieved.

Not so with this car, no.

It's a very much an, if you know, you know type of car

which suits me just fine.

So the, the, they sat around unsold

for maybe many of the same reasons that we're touching on,

which is that it's not that as usable as most other things

and I don't know what else.

It's a, it's a little bit crude for sure.

Like the unfinished fiberglass and the way that the,

like front and rear clips open feel,

like you can feel the flexing the way that the noise

when the door is open fully, you can hear

the sort of fiberglass deflecting,

like it just makes all these not very expensive

sounding noises.

None of that was engineered, right?

It was, it's incredibly focused and was designed very clearly

to do one thing only, which is,

which is the insufficient numbers to be homologated.

Yes.

And then, you know, so again, go go rally,

which it did with considerable success.

So the, the efforts to get this, let's see, where do we go?

So, Lancia had an existing relationship

with Peninferina when this car was designed

in much the same way that Ferrari did.

And so Bertone and both cases were able to get in

with the 308 GT4 and Bertone and Bertone with the,

the Stratos, but the sort of origin was the Stratos zero.

And that's the car you've seen, I think, at Villedesta,

was it there the year that you were there?

It lives in the US now, but it's been to Villedesta,

and I can't remember where it was there.

I think I did see it, but I love the story.

It was new to you driving it.

Yeah, it's a door stop of a car

that with a single glass thing on the front of it

that opens and closes.

And when they, when Bertone developed that car

as a concept, they didn't do so with Lancia's awareness

at all, let alone endorsement or anything like that.

And in fact, the story goes, I don't know if this is true,

they bought a wrecked Fulvia to use the powertrain

out of to make the Stratos zero concept car.

And so they released this thing

and they showed it to her in a 1970 at the Motor Show.

And everyone's like, well, that thing is fucking psychedelic.

And that was in, let's see, November,

turn is in November of 70.

And Lancia, at the same time, the Fulvia,

which is front-wheel drive and front engine,

is starting to suffer in rally events

against the Alpine A110.

And so they're like, we need a new rally car.

And so Lancia saw this thing and they're like,

huh, interesting.

And so they called up Newt Show Bertone

and they were like, hey, could you bring that thing by here?

We'd like to have a look at it

because we would like to do a clean sheet rally car

and are interested in your thoughts on the subject.

So he drove the car across tour

and because Lancia and Bertone are both in tour.

And shows up at the gate and he describes the gatekeeper

as being absolutely flabbergasted.

He did, as by the way, he recounts it,

wait for the man to open the gate,

but he said it wasn't not necessary

because the car could have driven up under the gate.

I much prefer the conventional story.

That's the version that everyone tells,

which is that he drove it under the gate.

But he apparently out of respect, which

makes sense in a professional context

where you're trying to sell business,

wait for the man to open the gate,

even though it was unnecessary.

But I love that.

The idea of the car is so low that it would fit under.

And then all the Lancia racing guys heard the noise

because the car had no muffler.

If you ever hear the Stratos Zero run,

it really sounds raucous.

And all the Lancia racing guys.

That was a force owner.

Yeah, it's a V4, yes.

Came out.

And then this is like January of 71

and the contract to develop the Stratos was developed.

It was signed, I think, in February or March.

I think it was February 17th.

That was pretty quick.

And then the concept Stratos, which

looks more like the production car than not like it,

but is different in some details,

was shown, I think, in Turin in 71.

So, you know, seven, eight, nine months later,

the car is displayed in concept form.

And then they have to do the actual engineering.

And they took this sort of strategy

to develop the car, which I think is now pretty normal,

but was unusual then, which is that they surveyed

the drivers and the mechanics and the engineers,

like what would make the ideal rally car for?

Design a rally car from the ground up like what should it do?

And that's why it has the easily removable clips

and the approach into departure angles that it does.

And the adjustability of the suspension,

and the easyness of replacing the powertrain, all that stuff

was designed in so that it would be really good

at its one mission.

So, they didn't know what engine it was going to have

originally.

Bertone had some Ferrari V6s lying around,

so they threw one into the concept car

just because they needed to put something in there.

But it took them a super long time

to get the agreement from Ferrari to supply the engines.

And Enzo was pretty enthusiastic about it,

but Ferrari had been bought in 1969,

as was Launcha, both by Fiat.

They were both bought by Fiat in 1969.

And so, while Enzo was still in control of racing,

he was not in control of road car stuff,

and so it was not his decision to make

to authorize the use of those engines.

And it took like more than two years

before Ferrari agreed to supply the engine.

There was some reason they agreed, I don't remember what it was.

Allegedly, it was a financial incentive.

I think also the car debuted because they

hadn't homologated, and they hadn't built the 500 units

because they didn't have the engines to do it.

The car was racing as a prototype before that.

It didn't get homologated until the first of October of 74,

but I think the car debuted in like 72 racing.

And I think it initially broke.

I guess you will be not surprised at all

to learn that the part of the car that broke

was the transmission in the early ones.

And this is a D-no to 46 D-no transmission.

That's right.

And so, I think eventually, the car's initial performance

is when it started running stuff at one,

the first big thing that it one was the Tour de France, which

is a, I don't know what it is, it's a bicycle event.

And so, of course, they were very overpowered

compared to the bicycles when they had easily won.

The answer I'm strong was Erie, so the thing just

whizzed right by him.

In spite of all the stuff he had put in his blood.

The Tour de France is like a thing in France

where you drive between various race tracks

and hill climbs and stuff.

And so, you do all the hill climbs and races on the tracks,

but you also drive from event to event.

And it takes seven or nine days or however long it takes.

And the car won the Tour de France, I think it's 70, three, maybe.

And so, they were like, OK, OK, we'll

give you the engines to build these things.

And it was such that they were so uncertain

that I don't think that they even, like,

Lancia never asked Bertone to make the engines

until, like, mid-73.

No, sorry, never asked them to make the chassis and bodies

because they weren't sure enough they were going to have engines

to put in them until, like, two years

after the car initially debuted because Ferrari

and them were digging around for so long

on the agreement to supply powertrain.

So Bertone managed to get Lancia to work with them

despite the fact that, you know,

Kenanferina had designed the Flaminia Coupe and the Flavia

and they did the beta Monte Carlo after.

So there was a very established relationship with Kenanferina

and Lancia's, you know, Bertone's goal

was to try and sort of get some business in there, which they did do.

But there were no Bertone Ferraris or other Lancia's

after this car, so maybe it didn't work that well.

Well, there was a GT4.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Each of them got one car with Bertone and then there were none

and there was no record awards.

Was he a bastard?

I don't think so, I don't think so.

Never met him.

As a Bertone product is very interesting to interact with this car

because there's so much of it that parts spin stuff

where you're like, I recognize this and this and this.

They're all put in the middle from 3o8 GT4.

There was first thing I noticed when I walked up to it.

And I think the X1 9 maybe uses that door handle as well.

And I believe so.

And then you open the door and then the trunk releases.

And then you're all go, yeah, the trunk releases

every other damn car the Kuntosh has it

because it was also Bertone produced car.

And the 3o8 GT4 has the same trunk release handle.

The interior door releases share with the Miura

as it's the locking button.

I didn't recognize the turn signal stocks,

but they are the sort of regular fiat like.

Fiat 124.

Is that where they're from?

Yeah, my mom had four of those cars

and they're identical.

The gauges I think are shared maybe with the 124

or maybe it's the Fiat Dino.

The Fiat Dino coupe was designed by Bertone.

This is the spider was pinning Freena.

So fiat split the difference.

They had the coupe version by Bertone

and the roadster version or convertible version

done by pinning Freena,

which Alfroman actually also did in the 50s.

With the Giulietta.

Really?

The Giulietta Sprint is a Bertone car

as is the Sprint Pitch Spechale.

But the open cars were pinning Freena.

So I don't know why everybody had a,

every major Italian manufacturer was Philander.

Right.

Wow.

What else?

When you say gauges, the thing I want to point out

is that the red lines are 8,000 RPM?

Yes, which is, it's still a shitload of RPM,

was a shitload of RPM, especially in the late 60s

or early 70s.

I'm not sure I did not rev it that high.

I'm not sure it really makes all that much power.

I think it goes yellow at 75 or something.

7,000?

7,000.

And I don't think I took it even to 7,000.

But it, oh my god, the noise.

Incredible, incredible noises.

I don't know if anybody calls it the loud pedal anymore,

but this car explains to you why it's called the loud pedal.

Anything with, like, I, I, I, TB cars do this for sure.

Anything with ITBs or carburetors does this?

Yeah, but you know what's funny.

So we got, we took this for a drive and then we came back

and we had to go grab lunch and we got in Beatrice,

my, my shitbile E30.

And if it's the one defining characteristic of an E30

from an acoustic experience, perspective to me,

it's the fact that there's so much mechanical noise

of that M20 in an E30 that, like, that does not exist today.

And I take people all the time, that one of the magic parts

about an E30 is the perfect mixture of intake exhaust

and mechanical noise.

And the mechanical noise is always what's missing.

And the first words out of your mouth,

when you think we made it to, like, around the corner

and you said the word that was in the process

of leaving my mouth, which was, remember what was it?

Refined, civilized.

We both said civilized at the same time.

And it's like, oh, and you're like,

yeah, the engine is just so far away.

I'm like, yeah, it sounds like it's two cars over, right?

I mean, that's the difference.

And an E30 is very engine centric from the, from the,

normally, unless you are getting out of the car like this.

The engine compartment with that thing.

And it's not a clattery terrible noise

the way modern cars are.

And that is a thing that, you know,

people throw these words around all the time.

And it's a reflection, I think, of the experiences

that they have had.

And they will describe cars like the first generation NSX

as refined, as analog and raw and visceral.

What?

People say that, no, I mean, oh, like the way

that you do about the E30, right?

It depending on what, if you're coming out of an E golf,

E golf, then like, yes, these cars,

you know what that was a slip from,

was the nickname for our old colleagues, E golf.

If you're coming out of, I know you will.

E golf, they call it a, E golf Hitler.

Yes.

But they're, because they're Italian

on the way they pronounce the E golf Hitler.

But I don't know how you got to Hitler on that.

But however, yeah, no, people will describe that.

Describe things that are not actually visceral

or analog as visceral and analog being created.

Everyone says, oh my God, the noise is so good.

Well, it's coming from the speakers and subwoofer

and be whatever, you know, the mechanical noises

completely absent.

So you're hearing mostly fake,

but just piped in noise anyway, right?

So, if you are describing cars like 996s

as visceral and raw, then I recommend you go try

a real car.

I mean, yeah, 996 is showing our car.

I think they are so refined and like civilized.

I remember when we went in a rally,

and I had my Elise, and I swapped with our friend

who is in his boxster.

It is 96 boxster.

96 boxster.

Yes.

Yeah, it was an S too, and it sounded really good

from the outside, and it was quite lovely.

And I got in and I thought, it's broken.

Is it on?

Is it running?

And that's coming from an Elise.

Yeah, no, you cannot describe.

I don't think there are any modern cars

that you can describe as actually visceral.

There are very few of them.

Yeah, this is off the scale though.

I mean, it 100% is.

And this is the thing where we always harp on,

like have maximum number of experiences that you can,

because if you were imagining a number scale from one to 10,

and if a modern Tesla is a 10 and a, sorry,

in terms of civilizedness.

Civilized-y, OK, so the same-line scale.

You know, someone is like, oh, and NSX is very visceral.

Blah, blah, blah.

And you're like, well, maybe if you've only,

and I would put the NSX as a 7.7, if the Tesla is a 10.

Oh, interesting.

That low, you think it's more refined than that.

Well, so if you've only existed between 7700 and 700,

then you have no idea what a 2.1 is like.

And which is this?

Yeah.

So I just, I hesitate when I see someone,

if I see someone has described a car

that I know objectively compared to like an old race car.

I mean, because this is quite civilized

compared to like a vintage race car,

like a C2 Corvette race car or a sort of-

I think it's civilized compared to most race cars I've driven.

Yes, definitely.

Like the engine feels like it's mounted in rubber.

It's not bolted directly to the chassis, for example.

At 100 miles an hour on the freeway, it's fine.

Even with the window, we didn't close the windows

all the way and I realized afterwards.

And it was totally fine.

In fact, well, that's because there's so much mechanical noise

from the engine you can't hear any of the windows.

We were able to talk to each other.

I mean, it wasn't that bad.

It wasn't that bad.

The primary ride is very good.

And then, I mean, immediately when we got on the freeway,

my first question was, is that speedometer accurate?

We weren't even on the freeway.

We were in a 45 zone and I'm seeing 80 kilometers an hour

on the speedo and I'm thinking, that's 50 miles an hour.

I think we may be doing like 35 or something.

Let me just make sure the speedo's accurate.

So we pull out ways and we look in charge.

It's been like three mile an hour of being accurate.

Close enough to being effectively accurate.

And I thought, wow, it's surprisingly refined.

And I also love the way this thing car rides.

The fact that 1200 RPM, you can scratch the throttle

wide open and it just goes without a stop.

That is one of my really overarching early impressions

of the first time I ever drove a Stratos,

is that you feel how much lighter it is than a 246.

It really feels a lot lighter than a 246 in every respect,

whether that's the power to weight ratio

or the way that the chassis behaves

or the way it changes direction.

It feels.

Well, there's no roll.

I mean, I'm sure there is on it.

It's, I mean, the car is 300 pounds,

300, 400 pounds lighter than a 246.

It's 2100 versus 24 to 2500, depending on the variant

and market of the 246.

It's, you know, 20%.

I'm not quite almost 20% lighter.

Did they, did they quote, did anyone ever test it

and get zero to 60 numbers out of it?

I'm sure they did.

I don't know what they are.

I'm sure they're terrible because it's dogly first.

It's dogly first that one two shift really kills everything.

Yeah, but I bet that's a high five type of power level.

Which, you know, and the Elise with 190 horsepower

is what, like, a 4.9 or something like that?

Naturally aspirated?

5.5-flat-ish.

Yeah, so this car is 4.8.

Yeah.

Yeah, same sort of thing.

I mean, it doesn't quite feel that fast.

I'm going to say, but then again, the Elise is similarly visceral,

I would say, but it's also your,

it's overwhelmed with induction noise in a way that this is not.

So that even seems a little bit more violent.

You get that peaky power delivery.

This just pulls everywhere.

I mean, this is music, comparatively,

and there's no contest, which is more ruckus,

which is more, you know, chassy tweaking noises in the Elise.

Yes, cracking about.

Yeah.

No, I loved it.

I mean, definitely one of the most entertaining cars

or most, most sensory overloady cars.

But in a very different way from Amira.

So when I took it to Carza Coffee,

someone was like, this or Amira?

To drive, to own, to look at, to do what?

Let's answer those each intern, I guess.

Drive, let's start with drive.

I haven't driven Amira in a while, but I,

the Amira is too much for me.

And then, but hold on.

The problem with Amira is it's too much at first

and then you get used to it.

And then you get into something you think is an experience,

and you're like, this is not going to court by comparison.

And so, I think I like the noise that this thing makes better.

I think I would choose to drive this over Amira.

I would too.

And it's not even close.

The thing about this car that I really

appreciate that the Amira does not do,

the Amira often asks you to make accommodations

and sort of learn how to ask what it needs.

And I guess this car kind of does that too.

But the Amira, at the faster you go in this car,

the better it gets.

And the Amira is the opposite of that.

The faster you go in Amira, the less good it gets.

There's a certain point beyond which you do not go in Amira,

in my experience.

And I feel the same way about the 308 GT4 and the 246.

And for different reasons.

They're different number of tenths.

I think the number of tenths is a larger number of tenths

in a 308 or a 246.

I think that number of tenths is like 8.5 tenths.

And the Amira, I think it's fewer.

Maybe it's seven and a half.

But the reason why, interestingly enough,

is very different to me.

I don't really want to go past eight or nine tenths

in my 308 because the car doesn't, it starts to...

It stops dancing.

Right, it turns to marshmallow.

The tires tuck under and it just starts to understand.

And it starts becoming understeer.

And it stops becoming alive and tactile.

And it's more like sort of like, oh, I see you're not having

a good time and you don't want this.

And this car's the opposite.

Well, but the reason I wouldn't go that further than that

in Amira is very different.

It's because it scares the shit out of me.

Because I don't trust it, I don't trust me to control it

and I don't think it's safe.

And I don't think it's durable.

I think there's that.

This car is...

I mean, I didn't, again, I got out of it.

I'm like, you drove that green car that much harder than this

and you're like, oh, yeah.

I mean, we slid around a couple corners and greasy stuff

and that was enough for me to say,

I don't want to say slid around.

It's not like I drifted around a corner.

We broke a few couple times.

Yeah, we found a limit and I just didn't want to get there.

Repeatedly, on a back road with ditches and trees

and, you know, when everything was slimy.

I was a slimy part that I think is really...

I would really like to push that car very, very hard

in a way that I don't think I would want to do in Amira

because you're not comfortable in that driving position.

Somebody we parked at, one of the guys

from across street came over and it's like,

oh, do you notice how crooked the driving position is?

And I'm like, it is.

Like it didn't even...

The position was so good.

There used to be a 308, also, which is similar.

I mean, I skewed.

The 30 skewed.

I mean, so many cars are skewed,

but the thing is skewed isn't the problem.

It's skewed when you can't reach things.

Like an AutoZam AZ1.

I can't get my hands under the wheel.

I can't control the car and whatever this was immediately

comfortable.

So there's...

Yeah, the interior is shaped a little bit like a pyramid.

There's a lot of space down low

and there's not much space up top.

But if you need to be flailing your legs

and your arms there's space to do that,

but not a lot of headroom, which Valtero complained a little bit.

Yeah, that was...

I mean, I smashed my head on the way.

And I just thought, I'm not that tall

and this is one of the few cars

that I ran out of headroom first.

Yeah.

Sandra Minare was not very big.

And so that he...

I don't know how the hell Walter drove on his cars.

Well, I think he really just liked driving this car

because he never was able to comfortably control it.

It was...

It's got a lot of seat travel.

So I moved the seat really far back.

And then, the steering was a little bit too far away.

It wasn't ideal, but that was the best way

for me to deal with that headroom issue.

Yeah, I mean, you feel also like you're sitting inside

of a helmet driving that car.

The windshield and side windows are shaped

like the visor of a helmet.

It really does feel like...

It's a very unusual view.

The other thing, one of my overarching first impressions

of this car is that when you sit in the driver's seat,

if the headlights are off,

you cannot see any car out of the windshield.

All you see is road.

The nose drops away so sort of sharply

that you have this, just the car disappears.

And so if you need to park, for example,

you put the headlights up.

So that you have a reference point

for where the end of the car is.

There are a lot of cars like that.

I mean, it doesn't bother me.

It's just an interesting characteristic

because I'm used to, like in the Miura,

your view is dominated by the fender,

the bulges of the fender.

It's incredibly pornographic looking,

sitting in that car because of the fenders

and this car, you see nothing.

Nothing.

Three or eight GT4, you see nothing either.

But what I do is I turn the headlights on

and cars like this.

So I can watch the beam pattern move as I'm getting,

like I'm looking the reflection of some whatever

I'm parking against to determine that.

So I know.

Absolutely.

That's what matters.

So yeah, the car was homologated.

October 1st, 1974.

The Rally San Remo was the very next day.

The homologation circumstances of this car

like the 037 are a little bit sketchy, perhaps.

Italian's being sketchy.

Yeah, right.

So the car had been racing for a while

but wasn't homologated because they hadn't built enough

of them.

And the FIA had to come and inspect them all.

And the FIA inspector was Paul Fraer,

who was former racing driver and later contributor

to, you know, he was a journalist.

And Ratchet Road and Track, exactly.

And he, I think, owned a strato subsequently.

But he was the inspector for this car

when it was, you know, to get it homologated.

And he'd like walked around and was like,

yeah, this seems good enough, it's close enough.

So, you know, and they applied because they were just like,

we need to get this damn car racing legally in Group 4.

So just fricking, you know, Cesarelli Mona,

who is the head of the Launcher Racing Department.

It's just like, fricking, just apply whatever,

like good enough, close enough,

we need to try and just see if we can go racing.

So the car's homologated on October 1st.

Rally San Remo was the very next day,

the Italian stage of the World Rally Championship

is the next day.

The car won, of course, legally for the first time in Group 4.

And this was in October of 74.

And then they were like, huh, interesting.

And they did the math with a remaining number of events

around the world.

And they're like, I think if we do well enough

in the remainder of the season, even though it's already October,

we have a chance at winning the World Rally Championship

for 1974.

And they did.

They had scraped together a few points

because they got third in the East African Safari

in like April of 74.

So they gathered those points together

and put them in a pile and then went to every other single damn

event including like one in Canada and one in Michigan.

There was a WRC event in Michigan

in 1974, the press on regardless, Rally.

And they went to New Zealand.

So they flew the damn thing all over the world

and then won the World Championship in 1974,

having started in October and the end of the year, yeah.

Which is just amazing and represented.

And then the car won again, the championship in 75 and 76.

And then Fiat pulled the plug on it

because the 131 had come out.

And Fiat, who was writing all the checks

because they owned Lancia, wanted their representation

of the Fiat group in the World Rally Championship

to look more like a car that customers could buy,

which the 131, or would buy, which was a three-box sedan

in the form of the 131.

So the 131 then went on and won the World Championship,

I think, two or three times as well before the 037,

which didn't come out to 82.

Which was also purpose-built.

As a Rally car, using a tub from the Beta Monte Carlo,

which we know as the Scorpion in the United States.

And everyone knows, thanks to the top gear,

to the Grand Tour.

Oh yes, that story.

I mean, that episode is incredible

of the sort of discussion of the homolgation

and that season.

Oh, that was hilarious.

No, there was just the finale special,

Clarkson had a Beta Monte Carlo

that everyone fell in love with.

Hmm.

Who knew?

So the Clarkson was a hammer driving it.

What I want to know.

I wouldn't know, having not seen it.

I haven't seen it.

I also don't know.

So yes, the car is,

they cost about the same as a 246.

And to me, that is criminal.

It should be more.

They made just about 2500 Dino 246 Dino's.

This car, they made 490, whatever of these.

And it's kind of a psychedelic design.

I don't know, the Dino's pretty here, obviously.

But this is really wild-looking, wowier.

Yes.

And it is one of the greatest rally cars of all time.

And he's the first purpose built rally car.

And I think also one of the most exciting drivers

cars to drive that has ever been built.

I stand by it.

I would have a hard time deciding between them

because I absolutely adored that.

I know, I like those cars too,

but I just, for me, this is so much,

it's so much more texture.

There's so many different ways to drive this car.

It's so like, I made me feel like alive

and dead at the same time

because I was on the verge of death,

but that's why I could, you know,

it's like motorcyclist, right?

This is a car for unhinged people.

And I don't know.

But you usually don't,

you're the one who usually likes hinged cars

and I like unhinged cars.

What I don't like is when the car feels like it's shitty.

And that's actually what I don't like.

I don't mind that it's unhinged.

I'd mind that it feels like shitty.

Shitty like, it's gonna break.

Yeah.

Or yes, like that it's gonna break or, you know,

yeah, I guess that's ultimately what it feels like.

It feels like all my cars aren't you?

I'm just making fun of the Volkswagen's and the Elise.

It's fun.

But yeah, there is no car I have ever interacted with

in any professional context that I have wanted more

than this one.

I will tell you there's a lot about this driving experience

that really reminds me and I know you're gonna give me a look.

Do you know what I'm gonna say?

No, I'm gonna guess it's Mark 1 Volkswagen.

No.

Not even close.

I mean, there is one parallel

which is how omnipresent the engine is.

But that's just because the Mark 1 Volkswagen's are shit.

Well, yeah, there's no structure.

There's not much between you and the engine,

which is very true.

There's no structure.

And the bad shift linkage.

And the fact that there's no structure.

And I don't know.

No, it's lots of structure.

It's all concentrated in the center part of the car

instead of the bodywork.

I don't even think it's that way on the Volkswagen's.

There's no structure period.

Yes, that's true.

No, no, no, four wheels.

Yes, that's it.

That's the only end of spare tire.

And some Mark 1 Volkswagen's like the Mark 2 car.

It was in Mark 1 car.

It's had a single wiper.

That's no.

No, it's that MAT new Stratos.

Because in the same way, when you start to look

at how it was finished, kind of crappy.

This car has a reason that it was done like that.

I know.

I know you're going to judge me for this.

But this sort of.

Well, it's $700,000.

You don't want it to be crappy.

So incidentally, that's exactly what these cars cost.

Yes, but that's not what they cost when they were new.

That what them being worth $700,000

be versus what they cost to build or make is different.

This car was cheap when it was new, relatively speaking.

And it looks it and that's OK.

And that's part of its mission as a rally car.

Now you say the word cheap.

It was almost as expensive as a Ferrari 246.

It was almost as expensive as a 911.

Which, OK, it's an exotic car.

But if you adjust that for inflation,

I would say if I compared this and a Ferrari 246 together

in their driving experience.

And then I compared a F430 Spachale and that new Stratos.

It's sort of the same thing, right?

I think it's a F430 Normale, not a F430 Stradale.

OK, fair point.

Regular one or a 360 or any sort of the modern men engine.

They are cruisers.

They're more luxury cars and more GTs than anything else.

And then I mean, the new Stratos lit my hair on fire.

And it wasn't about nice finishes and Poltrona Frau Leather

and air conditioning or whatever.

The car scared the shit out of me.

It put a smile on my face.

It was dirty as fuck.

It felt light.

It felt fast.

It felt exciting.

And it was totally dominated by the engine

and the way the Ferrari's never wore.

And that's the same thing as this relative to a 246.

So depending on how I'd want to drive it,

that's why they're so close, right?

246, I would want to drive everywhere.

And this is a little bit, I'd want to drive everywhere

if I was looking for an experience.

And so you're right.

We're OK with not seeing the sunset today.

Not making a sunset.

I mean, does it want you dead or does it pretend

that it wants you dead?

I don't know.

Is it evil?

I never died in it.

So there's one data.

It always feels like it's out of control.

I mean, at the edge of being under control.

Every time I lost an ax, like half the car

and end of the car, either under steering or over steering,

it was a pussycat to get back.

It never told me it was going to do it and just did it.

And then while it was doing it, it didn't tell me

it was doing it.

I mean, pushing around a corner or under steering,

it just, there's no way down the front.

So there's no steering feedback.

There's no nothing.

And we're just pushing.

But it didn't.

It wasn't like, oh, I sort of lifted

to regain some front traction.

And then it snapped and spun there.

Yeah, correct.

It's not evil.

The reputation that, for example, a carer GT has,

or event going, which I wouldn't even

have driven a carer GT.

I wouldn't even driven today in those conditions,

just because I'm not going to fall walker myself.

But no, it wasn't evil.

It just felt really alive, really responsive.

That's what I love most about that car.

It's an incredibly close conversation

between you and the car.

There's nothing in here.

You have no steering.

If this had 2, 4, 6, Dino steering

and a 2, 4, 6, Dino steering, a shift linkage,

it would easily be that car.

But I just can't get past the steering.

And the unassisted break, for me,

say, when you say stand on them,

you means actually pull the rim of that little tiny gorgeous

steering wheel.

And use it all over like we came to one on ramp

very quickly because a handy cripple

converted Minivan pulled right in front of us.

And I'm like, oh, I can get around him

before we get off this exit.

And it's a 270 degree decreasing radius, whatever.

And we came in hot.

And that was like, I don't know,

what was that being a leg lift machine?

180 pounds worth of effort on the brake pedal

to get to 0.7 G. I was like, Jesus Christ.

I mean, it is serious effort.

And I've driven plenty of unassisted cars

without vacuum unassisted and I left a brake normally.

So I'm not going to sell it.

The brake is meant to be used with the left foot.

It's another representation of the rally and that mission

of the car.

Totally cool with that.

But this is a, there's no reason for,

there's no reason for brakes to be that heavy.

There's no reason for a shifter to be that vague.

There's no reason for that section on the thing.

So I think you could probably do a couple things to this.

This car in particular, I would have

to find a way to get around that throttle linkage.

I'll seem to do that, which is weird.

I don't know.

I've only driven three straddles.

So maybe there are three that I've driven have been like that.

But that impression is strong with me

with the first and third.

I don't actually have it for the second one.

So maybe it can be engineered out or something.

We're talking, we are talking top 10 driving experiences

of the 3000 cars I've driven in the last couple years, right?

I mean, last 20 years.

So we're talking, how do you get it

to edge in front of my favorite Ferrari ever?

Well, those are the things that don't exist in the Ferrari.

Yeah, really cool.

I mean, if I had all the money in the world,

I would have one of those parked next to a new straddles.

Because of what about the Dino?

Oh, I'd have a Dino also.

Yeah.

All the money in the world.

This is of all, like I said, this is all of all the cars

I've ever interacted with professionally

as the car I've most wanted to keep myself.

Ever.

Number one.

You haven't driven a 280 yet.

That's true.

I have not.

I wonder if that would change you.

Can you hustle at high speed or a bumpy road?

Yes.

288.

Isn't it low?

Not low enough.

The only one that I drove this was a quick Marshall Petaluma

road in that car.

No problem.

Because I was driving on a road on the Monterey Peninsula

that was one of these roads that has all of the roots

have lifted the pavement.

And I mean, in a modern car, I would have slowed down.

And the owner was like, go, go, go, go.

And I just ran over these effectively speed bumps.

And it was, and nothing didn't care about any of it.

And that was one of the reasons I loved that 288 so much

because the shifter was great, the motor, the turbo noises,

all of it was so great.

And then it didn't give a fuck about bad pavement.

I thought, oh, this is a car that I

want to hustle on a back road.

This was, it was, it rides way smoother than this.

Like this is, the strut is as much stiffer as you'd imagine.

But yeah, no, no, no.

I think the cost is criminal.

The fact that these cars are worth the same

as a 246 or less than any number of other things.

Stop saying that because you're costing yourself

the ability to buy one one day.

Nobody will meaningfully act enough

to change the value of this car.

Although I will say that in the course of selling it,

we got bum rush.

And I was not expecting that to happen.

We became aware of this car, we meaning OTS.

Became aware of this car.

And I said, man, that thing is so freaking cool.

We need to have it in our lives.

We need to sell it.

We need to transact this car.

But I had nobody that I knew of who was looking for one.

Little did I know that I knew everybody who wanted one.

I just didn't know they were looking for one.

So we didn't have a customer in mind,

but we borrowed a bunch of money and bought it.

And you know, sold it on.

It arrived with us on a Wednesday

and we sold it, the guy flew in on a red eye,

Thursday night and bought it Friday morning.

So, you know, the moment he heard that it existed,

he said, hold the car for me.

Do not post it on social media.

Do not anything this car until I have a chance to see it.

It's, let me know as soon as it's gonna be there,

I will be there the next day.

Why did you listen to him?

You should have posted it every once in a while.

No, I mean, you just, you want to look after your people.

And so then after we, after he agreed to buy it,

then I started posting and then all these people were like,

is that available?

I'm interested in all these people came out of the woodwork

and all these people I didn't know

were looking for Stratos' apparently are.

So I guess if you know you do know,

but there's not, you know, they never sold these

in the United States.

I mean, representative of the half-heartedness

with which they sold this car when it was new.

They didn't even homologate it for certain European markets,

let alone the United States market,

which is part of the reason why there were so many

left over on sold.

And so there's very few in the United States

and a lot of them have had hard lives

and been beat up in various ways.

This is a 22,000 kilometer unrestored car.

And so I think the quality of the car, you know,

it has the original maintenance booklet

with the little card this that they print for you

when you are to become your service card or whatever.

It's like for Chevrolet, it's called a Protecto Plate.

It has all this stuff with it.

It's a really good example.

So I guess the people who know do know,

but it's not a super mainstream choice,

which I prefer it, actually, for that reason.

It's due to proof, for the reason.

Definitely.

No, I, I approve.

I mean, I wish I could have something like that.

Yeah, me too.

Maybe one day.

Maybe we'll get sponsorship by Lancia.

They'll give us Stratos.

I think Lancia is busy going out of business.

No, busy dying, yeah.

Yeah.

Sorry.

So cool.

Well, I am very appreciative to get that opportunity

to drive that car.

So thank you.

Especially now you sold it.

I think that's appreciative to the new buyer

who has probably has no idea that, no, no, no.

We told him we wanted to use it for some promo work

after the purchase.

And he was, I think, so anxious to get a yes to buy the car.

They said, whatever you want, just cheer it, whatever.

So he was happy to have us use it for various things.

And he won't care that I did donuts for two hours in it

after we recorded this.

Oh, is that where we're going?

Well, I guess we'd better wrap the episode up.

Bye.

In that case.

Peace.

We're the keys.

In it.

Peace, okay.

Peace in it.

There he goes.

I'm going to do this quickly.

I think I just heard Jason Herney ate a disc.

And Doug, here we have the Lemo Emu in its natural habitat, helping people customize

their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual.

Fascinating.

It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.

Uh, Lemo, is that guy with the binoculars watching us?

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Lancia Stratos: Original Rally Icon — The Carmudgeon Show Jason Cammisa & Derek Tam-Scott — Ep 178

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