1974 Lancia Stratos: Rally-Car Legend For Sale on Bring a Trailer

Car and Driver

18 hours ago

Arguably the most significant Lancia ever built, the Stratos nonetheless is not widely known and certainly not widely seen.
This HF Stradale is one of fewer than 500 built for homologation requirements, making it rarer than a Lamborghini Countach.
With an ultra-short wheelbase, a Ferrari-sourced V-6, and a tiny footprint, it's a fierce little world champion.
If asked to picture a championship rally car, you might imagine some chunky-fendered Mitsubishi or Subaru sedan, all boxy menace with a turbocharged four-cylinder engine boosted to within an inch of its life. Less expected would be something like a short-wheelbase wedge with a screaming heart from Maranello, and yet, the 1974, 1975, and 1976 World Rally Championship–winning car was just that: the Lancia Stratos. The car was an absolute rocket over the stages, but to compete, the rules said Lancia also had to build 500 examples for the road.
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Our find of the day—well, maybe even find of the year—at Bring a Trailer (which, like Car and Driver, is part of Hearst Autos) is a 1974 Lancia Stratos HF Stradale, just the second Stratos to ever come through BaT. This example is a blue-chip collector car, having been comprehensively refreshed to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past couple of years, and it has the desired certification from Lancia and Fiat's classic-car departments.
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Inspired by the Stratos Zero prototype from Bertone, literally the sharp end of the wedge-shaped automotive design trend that would sweep through the 1970s, the production Stratos was penned by Marcello Gandini, the man behind the Countach. Construction was modern racing technology at the time, a fiberglass body over a lightweight space frame, with a mid-mounted V-6 engine.
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That V-6 was sourced from Ferrari, and it was the same rev-happy 2.4-liter six that came in the Dino. Fed by three twin-barrel Weber carburetors, it was good for roughly 190 horsepower in roadgoing trim, with power sent to the rear via a five-speed manual transmission. In a car that hovered around 2000 pounds, that was plenty.
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Further, the Stratos has fully independent suspension at all four corners, and a wheelbase almost four inches shorter than that of a first-generation Mazda Miata. The curved windshield provides excellent forward visibility, and if you can't see well out the back, where's the problem in that? No Italian rally driver would care much about what was behind him.
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Sandro Munari, the Lancia works driver known as Il Drago, certainly didn't spend much time staring at the rearview of his race-prepped Stratos. He won the Monte Carlo rally three times in a row with the Stratos, along with multiple other WRC victories. This particular car is signed by him, and also by Miki Biasion, another Lancia works driver and WRC champion.
The HF designation on Lancias stands for "high fidelity" and is meant to indicate that the car provides a driving experience that is as precise as a high-quality stereo. Certainly, that Ferrari-sourced V-6 provides a thrilling soundtrack, and with that short wheelbase, wide track, and 205-series Pirellis, this Stratos is born to dance.
Designed from the ground up to be a rally champion, the Stratos delivered. As a road car, it's impossibly small, lively, and vital.
The auction ends on July 25.
Brendan McAleer
Contributing Editor
Brendan McAleer is a freelance writer and photographer based in North Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He grew up splitting his knuckles on British automobiles, came of age in the golden era of Japanese sport-compact performance, and began writing about cars and people in 2008. His particular interest is the intersection between humanity and machinery, whether it is the racing career of Walter Cronkite or Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki's half-century obsession with the Citroën 2CV. He has taught both of his young daughters how to shift a manual transmission and is grateful for the excuse they provide to be perpetually buying Hot Wheels. Read full bio