2024 Alfa Romeo Stelvio Ti on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Alfa Romeo's Giulia Quadrifoglio gets the GTA treatment

Alfa Romeo will celebrate 110 years of building some of the world's most emotional driving machines with a brand-new Giulia Quadrifoglio GTA. GTA, which stands for "Gran Turismo Alleggerita," is a throwback to the 1965 Giulia Sprint GT, which first got the treatment. The new GTA and GTAm will elevate the Giulia's already driver-friendly formula to a whole new level.  If the plain-Jane Giulia Quadrifoglio is a BMW M3 or Mercedes-AMG C63 competitor, the GTA is your Competition or "S" variant, respectively. It boasts more power, less weight, enhanced aero, a revised suspension, and a reworked chassis and interior designed to keep the driver in place and focused on one task and one task alone: driving fast.  The wick on the GTA's 2.9-liter twin-turbocharged V6 has been turned up a bit, resulting in a new peak rating of 540 horsepower (up 30 from the base car). To reduce weight, Alfa replaced a host of exterior panels with carbon fiber equivalents. The carbon treatment extends to some other components, such as a the drive shaft. Alfa says the net reduction works out to 220 pounds.  Outside, the aero has been completely revised with technical know-how provided by Sauber Engineering (of F1 renown). It also boasts 20-inch center-locking wheels and a titanium exhaust system. Alfa replaced many of the suspension bushings, the shocks and the springs with performance-friendly hardware. The GTAm pushes the formula even farther. We hesitate to compare a sport sedan to a GT Coupe, but the relationship between GTA and GTAm is quite similar to that between the Porsche 911 GT3 and GT3 RS. Both are fundamentally the same car, but the latter compromises a great deal more of its daily drivability for the sake of improving its on-track feel and performance.  With the GTAm, this included a set of carbon-backed front bucket seats with six-point harnesses, Lexan window inserts for the side and rear windows, and a rear seat delete. In place of the rear bench, you get a harness bar attached to a structural roll hoop, plus a handy little cubby for storing your custom Bell helmet in Alfa's GTA livery (which comes with the car, as well as an Alpinestars race suit, gloves and shoes, and a personalized Goodwool car cover). Checking in at just 3,350 pounds, the GTAm boasts a power-to-weight ratio of 6.2 pounds per horsepower, which Alfa says is the best in the class, enabling a 0-60 run in just 3.6 seconds.

Best sport sedans for 2022 and 2023

SUVs dominate the car industry at every size and price level, but some people still prefer the looks, and more importantly, the performance and comfort, of the traditional sedan. With a lower ride height, lighter weight and generally smaller size, they often are much more fun to drive, and can even be more comfortable. Sport sedans of course lean harder on the performance side of things, and are among the best options for sheer speed and fun, thanks to those inherent characteristics. We've rounded up the ones in the segment that do the sporty dance better than any others in 2024 to give you a handy guide when you're shopping for one of your own. You'll find a wide array of cars here including gas, electric and hybrid powertrains. They'll have manual and automatic transmissions and drive the front, rear or all four wheels. Technically a few hatchbacks have slipped in, but they're close enough in look and feel that we wanted to include them. And excluding them means you might miss out on some of the best-driving options available. You wouldn't want that, would you? Alfa Romeo Giulia Why it stands out: Punchy four-cylinder; astounding power from Quadrifoglio; light and nimble character; awesome shift paddlesCould be better: Clunky infotainment; sub-par switchgear Read our Alfa Romeo Giulia review We start this list with one of the most predictable inclusions: the Alfa Romeo Giulia. Yes, it's a stereotype that the Italian sport sedan is fun to drive, but the fact is, well, it is. The Giulia comes standard with a turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder making 280 horsepower, making it one of the most powerful four-cylinders in the segment. It's paired with a snappy and smooth eight-speed transmission and either rear-wheel or all-wheel drive.  The engine is lively and torquey, if a little short of revs, and the chassis feels super-light. The steering is eager and the car jumps into corners. We also highly recommend getting a version with the enormous and superb aluminum paddle shifters that make clicking through gears much more entertaining. And on the topic of the interior, it's attractive, but the various switches and knobs feels a little cheap, and the infotainment system is clunky. Of course there's also the incredible Giulia Quadrifoglio at the high end. It gets a Ferrari-derived twin-turbo 2.9-liter V6 making 505 hp, and it's rear-wheel drive only.

Is your new-car warranty good at the race track?

We've all heard the horror stories. Your buddy knows a girl that was dating a guy whose best friend's brother once broke his brand-new, recently purchased performance car while making runs at a drag strip or laps at a track day, and the manufacturer wouldn't cover the repair under warranty. True story? Urban legend? Complete crap? Yes, no, maybe. One thing's for sure: Automotive warranties have always come with caveats. In 1908, an ad in the Trenton Evening Times clearly stated: "All Ford Cars Guaranteed for One Year." Although it changed over time, by 1925 the Ford New Car Guarantee only covered 90 days on material and 30 days on labor, and it clearly stated that that there was "No guarantee whatever on Fan Belts, Glass, Bulbs, Wiring, Transmission, Bands, Hose Connections, Commutator Shells, Rollers, Spark Plugs or Gaskets." Whether or not Ol' Henry would pay to fix your Model T if you broke it shaving a tenth off your lap time at the local board track seems to be lost to history. We're guessing no. But what about today? Do new-car warranties in 2017 cover cars when they are driven on race tracks? We researched the warranties of 14 auto brands to find out, and the answer is yes, no, maybe, depending on the brand, in some cases the model, and whether or not your car is modified from stock. Acura has been out of the high-performance car game for a number of years, but jumps back into the party in 2017 with its hybrid-powered $173,000 NSX supercar. And Acura's warranty, as well as Honda's, clearly states that it does not cover "the use of the vehicle in competition or racing events." View 33 Photos So we asked Sage Marie, Senior Manager of Public Relations for Honda and Acura. "If the car is stock, the warranty covers it on a track just as it does on the street. No question," he told us. "However, if the car is modified, say with slick tires or other components that would put higher stresses on the vehicle's parts and systems, then we would have to investigate the circumstances further." Marie went on to say the same would be true for any Acura model or Honda vehicle, including the new 2017 Honda Civic Si. This became a common theme. Chevrolet actually started this practice with the fifth-generation Camaro on the high-performance ZL1 and Z/28 models.