Rare Rides: A 2008 Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione - Exquisitely Italian

Corey Lewis
by Corey Lewis

Rare Rides has featured many an Alfa Romeo in past editions, but none as new as today’s 8C. With its very striking design, a limited manufacturing run, and a very high price when new, the low-slung coupe was instantly rare. A daring coupe from a small Italian manufacturer.

Let’s go.

Alfa Romeo was fairly consistent in fielding a coupe from the early 1950s through the 2000s. Much less consistent was the company’s development of a dedicated sports car offering. Often going dormant in that market space for a decade or more, the nearest predecessor to today’s 8C is the RZ. That rectangular roadster was the later run of the SZ coupe featured here previously. And it exited production after 1994.

Nine years later, Alfa Romeo was ready to hint at its next sports car, when it debuted a concept at the 2003 Frankfurt Motor Show. The (nearly production-ready) concept was designed in-house at Alfa Romeo by German-born designer Wolfgang Egger. The 8C’s design was meant to hearken back to the exciting sporting Alfas of the Fifties and Sixties, and even its name pegged it as direct successor to the exciting 6C that competed at Mille Miglia.

Enough interest was generated at the Frankfurt show that Alfa Romeo decided to proceed with production, making the official announcement in 2006. Changes from the concept to the production 8C were very few, and included slightly different lamps, different wheels, and a hood which hinged from the rear instead of the front. 1,400 people put in their orders for a new 8C, and production started in 2007.

The slinky body of the 8C was made of carbon fiber, attached to a steel chassis. Lighter construction methods kept weight down to 3,494 pounds. Cars were finalized by Maserati in Modena. Though the 8C rode on a unique platform, it did share many parts with the Maserati GranTurismo. The engine itself was a collaborative design from Maserati and Ferrari — a 4.7-liter V8 built at Ferrari. Power on offer was a considerable 444 horses and 354 lb-ft of torque. The transmission, which had six speeds, was an automated manual that could be operated in two different manual modes and three automatic ones. 62 miles per hour arrived in 4.2 seconds, and top speed was officially reported at 181 mph.

Alfa Romeo never planned to fulfill all the orders it received for the 8C, limiting its coupe production to 500. Buyers forked over $265,000 for the privilege of owning one. A Spider version of the 8C arrived in 2008 and matched the coupe’s production figure of 500. It upped the ante on price, to $299,000. By the conclusion of production in 2010, a thousand 8Cs existed.

Today’s Rare Ride is the most commonly selected color: Alfa Red. One of the 90 cars delivered to the U.S. market, it’s covered just 2,862 miles in the past 12 years. Complete with its branded luggage, this 8C will set you back $319,900.

[Images: seller]

Corey Lewis
Corey Lewis

Interested in lots of cars and their various historical contexts. Started writing articles for TTAC in late 2016, when my first posts were QOTDs. From there I started a few new series like Rare Rides, Buy/Drive/Burn, Abandoned History, and most recently Rare Rides Icons. Operating from a home base in Cincinnati, Ohio, a relative auto journalist dead zone. Many of my articles are prompted by something I'll see on social media that sparks my interest and causes me to research. Finding articles and information from the early days of the internet and beyond that covers the little details lost to time: trim packages, color and wheel choices, interior fabrics. Beyond those, I'm fascinated by automotive industry experiments, both failures and successes. Lately I've taken an interest in AI, and generating "what if" type images for car models long dead. Reincarnating a modern Toyota Paseo, Lincoln Mark IX, or Isuzu Trooper through a text prompt is fun. Fun to post them on Twitter too, and watch people overreact. To that end, the social media I use most is Twitter, @CoreyLewis86. I also contribute pieces for Forbes Wheels and Forbes Home.

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  • IBx1 IBx1 on Aug 02, 2020

    They should have built these with a real transmission, and they should have built a ton of them. Such a timelessly gorgeous design absolutely betrayed by having an automatic.

  • FThorn FThorn on Aug 02, 2020

    This is the only car that takes my breath away. The only car that stirs my emotions. Lovely.

  • 1995 SC At least you can still get one. There isn't much for Ford folks to be happy about nowadays, but the existence of the Mustang and the fact that the lessons from back in the 90s when Ford tried to kill it and replace it with the then flavor of the day seem to have been learned (the only lessons they seem to remember) are a win not only for Ford folks but for car people in general. One day my Super Coupe will pop its headgaskets (I know it will...I read it on the Internet). I hope I will still be physically up to dropping the supercharged Terminator Cobra motor into it. in all seriousness, The Mustang is a.win for car guys.
  • Lorenzo Heh. The major powers, military or economic, set up these regulators for the smaller countries - the big guys do what they want, and always have. Are the Chinese that unaware?
  • Lorenzo The original 4-Runner, by its very name, promised something different in the future. What happened?
  • Lorenzo At my age, excitement is dangerous. one thing to note: the older models being displayed are more stylish than their current versions, and the old Subaru Forester looks more utilitarian than the current version. I thought the annual model change was dead.
  • Lorenzo Well, it was never an off-roader, much less a military vehicle, so let the people with too much money play make believe.
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