The long tail Alpine is back

A collaboration between Zagato and the Polish performance car sales centre La Squadra brought back the long tail Alpine. Based on the current Alpine A110, an aero long tail – and a short tail – A220 is making an appearance. 19 of these AGTZ Twin Tails will be built.

The A220 takes us back to Alpine history in the sixties. After years of focusing on the Index of Performance and the Index of Efficiency with slick, aero-shaped but underpowered Renault engines, Alpine decided to try and mix it with the big boys and aim for overall victory.

First V8 Alpine

The Alpine A220’s arrival coincided with the power struggle between Ford and Ferrari coming to a climax. Amedée Gordini built a 3-litre V8 by joining two 1.5 fours. The first Alpine A210 thus debuted in 1967. For 1968, the ACO – Le Mans’ organising committee – capped engine capacity at 3 litres for prototypes and at 5 litres for sports cars (like the Ford GT40 MkI). Alpine’s Jean Redélé came with an ambitious program around the V8-powered A220 – sponsored by Renault – but the car’s flaws led to dramas on track.

If you want to read more about these early Alpines at the Le Mans 24 Hours, we warmly recommend issue 8, where Natan Tazelaar documents Alpine in the sixties at La Sarthe.

Short tail

La Squadra’s Jakub Pietrzak is a massive Alpine fan, and he commissioned a new A220 with the famous Italian coachbuilder Zagato. Based around the new Alpine A110 road car, Zagato came up with both a long tail and a short tail bodywork in carbon. The long tail can be separately attached, giving the owner two coachwork styles.

The short tail references to the adaptations Alpine made to chassis 1731, to adapt the A220 to shorter tracks. It proved better suited for hill climbs, and in a Nogaro race, Jean Vinatier was leading with the short tail A220, until his water temperature soared three laps from the end. The short tail was then road homologated – the only A220 – for the Circuit des Cévennes road rally, where it retired.

In the meantime, Alpine and Renault started focusing on what would become a far more successful rally campaign with the A110 berlinette.

AGTZ Twin Tail

Zagato’s changes have also given the front bodywork a treatment that is more in line with the A220. Mechanically, the car retains its 1.8-litre turbocharged four cylinder engine. The car is named AGTZ Twin Tail, and will be put on display at Lake Como in Italy at the end of May, coinciding with the Concorso d’Eleganza in Villa d’Este. No more than 19 of these will be made, each costing €650,000 ($707,000) before taxes.

More info here.