Lancia Stratos

Lancia Stratos History

The Stratos, created by Betone, was built with one goal in mind: to win the World Rally Championship. The Stratos was presented in two prototype forms, one at the Turin Motor Show in 1970 and another one a year later. The road-going variants of this automobile were only produced to meet homologation requirements. As a result, the road version had an extremely loud cockpit, was unpleasant and lacked adequate cabin air circulation; as you would expect from a rally car. Cooling fans and a spare tyre were housed at the front of the vehicle. As a result, when it came to storage, it was inconvenient.

The Stratos won its maiden rally appearance in 1973. It dominated the rally circuit from 1974 to 1976, winning the World Championship each year. Lancia was owned by Fiat, who also controlled Ferrari, so there was an abundance of resources to draw from. As a result, a Ferrari Dino V6 quad-cam engine was installed at the back of the Stratos. The engine produced about 200 horsepower, allowing the automobile to go from zero to sixty miles per hour in under seven seconds. A five-speed manual transmission and 9.9-inch vented disc brakes were also installed.

Bertone built the body, and lightweight fibreglass was utilised whenever practical. The rear spoiler created downforce and directed air into the engine ducts, but it also channelled dust on some safari stages, which was not ideal and caused a few issues. If the car turned over, the spoiler was powerful enough to absorb the impact of the fall.

The Lancia Stratos was the first automobile designed specifically for rallies, where it achieved great success, and because only 400 copies were manufactured, it permitted some lucky people to purchase a road-going competition machine. It had a groundbreaking design with ageless beauty, and it was one of the first modern "supercars." With a top speed (in production form) of 143 mph and 0-60 mph in 6.8 seconds, coupled with exceptional handling and braking, few vehicles could equal it in real-world driving conditions: going from point A to point B via winding roads.

The Stratos originally surfaced in 1970 as a Bertone style exercise on Lancia Fulvia running gear and was picked up by Cesare Fiorio, Lancia's competition manager at the time. Soon after, a prototype with a Lancia engine was developed, but the car's potential was so tremendous that a 2.4 litre Ferrari Dino engine was installed, and a legend was born. When the Stratos was run by the works in international rallies, it was possibly the first car in history that was expected to win. So good, in fact, that it won the World Championships in 1975 and 1976. Fiat, the parent business, subsequently changed its competition philosophy and decided to win rallies with a new car, although the Stratos continued to compete. A privately entered Stratos won the Monte Carlo Rally in 1979, one of the most astounding performances in modern racing history.