Leading from the rear
2020 ALFA ROMEO GIULIA QUADRIFOGLIO
ON STAGE WAS anew limited-edition Giulia GTA and the slightly more extreme GTAm. A bit more power than you get with the Quadrifoglio, but only a bit, and the main differences are cosmetic. They’re unleashing 500 total, worldwide, and they’re all based on the Quadrifoglio – which has just had a few revisions.
Mechanically, little has changed. But, then, little needed to change. Up-front there’s a 2.9-litre biturbo V6 that pumps out 503bhp and 443lb ft, the latter from just 2500rpm. It does so with the kind of snarl you might expect of an Alfa, though that’s overlaid by whooshy turbo aspiration. All that twist action is fed via an eight-speed paddleshift dual-clutcher to the rear wheels, and headline figures say 0-62mph in 3.9sec and a top speed of 190mph. Extremely serious.
I’ll be honest: until now, I hadn’t driven any variety of Giulia, and I was expecting something that would be too harsh to work well on UK roads. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Sure, with all that power and torque and rear-drive, there’s no doubt that this could be an extremely lairy partner, but, while I have vivid memories of keeping the traction control warning lamp pretty much permanently lit on a 156 GTA in 2003, the new car gets its power down beautifully and keeps itself in check.
Alfa’s test route involved some rather beautiful roads that parallel the M40 in Buckinghamshire, a few miles outside the M25, but the area was already snarling up with late-Friday traffic. So I hunted down a long-remembered climb through some fabulous (and quietly trafficked) S-bends just north of Stokenchurch, and
spent a memorable half-hour or so blasting up and down them. The car was in its element and so was I. It’s just so supple, feeling really at ease despite broken British tarmac, cornering with superb balance and with an alert helm that doesn’t advertise its electric assistance, instead managing to feel organic and linear in its responses.
It’s rare for a car of such neck-snapping ability to ride without the head-nodding gait of a BTCC entrant, but the Giulia has a wonderfully languid feel, so it’s a kind of practical GT, with decent space for four and a boot, yet with full entertainment laid on. Spotters will note electric seat adjustment, a revised centre console, new wheel and new infotainment graphics within, and a more assertive grille, new tail light graphics and fresh colours outside. It remains pretty rather than showy and, while you can spec some visible carbonfibre, the fact that the roof, bonnet and propshaft keep their weave hidden as standard lets you know a little about Alfa’s detail work. Thank goodness they left the rest alone.
If four doors aren’t practical enough, for six grand more than the Giulia’s £67,195 base price you can swap to the high-riding five-door Stelvio, with four-wheel drive. Its engine is equally potent and cultured, and it does well in every respect for such a lofty beast. But as I write this, a couple of weeks after driving both, it’s the Giulia I remember with most fondness. Its well-bred feel and surprising level of involvement really made an impression. More lovely than lairy.