There was a time when the most lauded minds in the land argued that the Earth was flat and witches walked among us, and protesters would find themselves burned at a stake as heretics or doused in a river until they found the only way to prove their mortality-dying. Sometimes the general consensus is hopelessly wrong, but it takes brave individuals to try and overcome the prejudice.
One such consensus in the motoring world is how much power a front-wheel-drive car can have before torque steer takes over. This figure has steadily risen over the years, but few believe a fwd hatchback with much more than 200 bhp can work, and the major manufacturers tend to switch to four-wheel or rear-wheel drive when injecting massive amounts of horsepower into a small car.
But there are dissenting optimists refusing to give in to the cloud of negativity, including Jarno Djelalian, who runs Autodelta. Having tuned Alfa Romeos for 2 decades he worked his way up the power stakes to this, his most extreme creation to date-the 3.7-liter, 328-bhp 147 GTA. It's based on the 250-bhp Alfa that was already pretty intense in its own right.
Autodelta bored out the standard 3.2-liter unit in the Alfa 147 GTA, which already produced 250 bhp and so was close to a subversive devil worshipper in some eyes. The company also fitted steel-billet camshafts, a Ferrari-derived enlarged throttle and a re-mapped ECU. Combined with a four-pipe sports exhaust, the mods add another 78 bhp to the mix and raise the torque to a more than respectable 260 lb-ft-this becomes a seriously pokey unit and would be welcome in many rear-wheel-drive sports cars.
On English roads there was no way to test the upper reaches of this 175-mph pocket-rocket's performance envelope, but this car delivered the proverbial mule kick at 110 mph when I floored the throttle. This is clearly not an engine that labors to deliver the last helping of speed, and the tempestuous V6's willingness to suspend disbelief and leave annoying 5 Series drivers in the distance was a constant reminder that this is no ordinary Alfa.
The 0-to-60-mph time dropped to 5 sec., but it wasn't easy to achieve as there was, inevitably, some lateral movement. This car weaved like a boxer as it struggled to put the power down in the first three gears, but this was partly due to the suspension settings on this particular example, and the fact that it took time to acclimatize to a throttle pedal this sensitive. A limited-slip differential with 30% locking ratio helped gather things together, though, and squirming away from a standing start is part of the pleasure of owning such a lively car.
It is not a test mule, this GTA belongs to a customer with a serious penchant for track days. Autodelta will drop a car as far as each customer wants. This youngster wanted his car on boneshaker settings and if it was any stiffer this car wouldn't take unleaded, it would run on Viagra.
Softer suspension could have helped the straightline acceleration, soaking up bumps in the road that had a serious influence on the direction of travel in this machine and sometimes necessitated a lift to avoid a smash with oncoming traffic.
It was one of those cars that would never let the driver relax, even for a second, but that's the way Autodelta's customers like it. "An Alfa isn't like a German car, which pretty much takes corners for you," said Jarno, with ill-disguised contempt. "These cars let you feel everything that's going on, and it's down to you to drive them."
On marble-smooth track in the hands of a skilled driver it has outpaced a BMW M3 and Subaru Impreza rally special, and on high-speed corners the limited-slip differential and rigid chassis came into its own to provide serious sports car performance in a hatchback chassis.
It was easy to spin the wheels and slip wide coming out of the slower bends, though, far too easy, and I couldn't honestly imagine owning this car. It was fantastic fun, but driving it round town would be a tense affair. The original Alfa was a handful, so drivers should know what to expect when they knock on Autodelta's door, but it's certainly a niche customer base.
Charging hard in this car is not a natural driving experience, and getting the best from the Autodelta is a cerebral affair. It's a little like finishing a Rubic's cube: There are far easier games that might be more instantly gratifying, but cracking this one is pretty damned satisfying.
Autodelta replaced the front brakes with a near biblical set of 355mm heat-treated discs and six-pot calipers. The rears retain the standard 276mm units fitted by Alfa, so the imbalance is clear to see through the 18-in. wheels, but with all the action at the front end it clearly made sense to boost the braking there as well and the balance under braking was hard to fault.
As to whether fwd cars can handle full-on sports car horsepower, the jury is still out as the rear-drive horsepower figures are growing all the time. This car struggled in some circumstances, but the likes of Jarno Djelalian deserve huge credit for challenging the preconceptions and coming pretty close to blowing the myths apart.