1956 Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTA

Alfa Romeo’s homologation special GTA was a lightweight race version of the Giulia Sprint GT road car. The extra “A” in the name stood for Alleggerita, the Italian word for lightweight. This was very appropriate as Alfa utilised light aluminium external body panels, thinner gauge inner steel panels, magnesium cam cover, wheels, bell housing, sump, and timing cover, and Perspex instead of glass.

The 1.6L inline 4 engine was overseen by the racing division of Alfa Romeo, Autodelta. They added a new twin spark high-flow head, high compression pistons, bigger cams, a larger oil sump with oil cooler, lightweight flywheel, a limited slip differential and shorter ratio gearing. 500 examples were produced by Alfa Romeo in total, with many going on to spend some time on the track partaking in races. As a result the amount of surviving GTA’s is a much smaller number.