Retro Alpine!

Perpetually on my "List of cars I'd like to drive some day",  five Renault Alpines A-110 from the Renault Classic collection will be taking part in this year's Rally Monte-Carlo Historique.  

Forty year ago, Alpine-Renault scored a 1-2-3 finish at the Monte and went on to win what was the first WRC manufacturers title.

The winning crew from 1973,  Jean Claude Andruet and Michele "Biche" Petit will be leading the group.  Madame "Biche" should be quite familiar with some of the roads, she just finished competing in the 2013  Rally Monte Carlo as a navigator in a Mitsubishi Evo IX!

Renault Alpine A110-50 on the streets of Monaco

And some historic A110 footage. It's useful to remember that the rear engined A110 were essentially like 911 if the engineers never tamed the horrid behavior. They were, how can I put it, tricky.



Now this A100=50 tribute, concept, race car, whatever it is,  looks very cool and at 400 hp x 880 kg with full aero, sequential gearbox and full Magneti Marelli data collection package (like on the Ferrari 458 Challenge) and the noise from that V6 turbo... well sounds like our kind of toy, right?

Press release straight from La Régie Renault, desktop sized pictures and more clips after the jump.

Renault is busy....but the Internet wants more!

After all the excitement over the super cool Megane R26.R, Renault fans are hungry for more.

The next generation Megane, now minus the funny looking rear, is being hot tested in the United States. Renault is said to be resurrecting the Alpine brand much like FIAT is using the Abarth scorpion for it's sportiest offerings and the blue Megane is a Photoshop rendering of a possible RS-Alpine. The copper colored car is the real car.

I wonder if the success of the Nissan Versa, nothing but a Megane in a boring suit, might tempt La Regie to try some hot FWD hatch VW Scirocco fighters in the US one day...