Story and photos by Graham Gauld
The scene was the Albergo Della Rocca, a small hotel in Bazzano near Modena in 1958.
Vittorio Rocchi, whose father owned the hotel, told me that a friend of his had just taken on the Abarth distributorship for the area and was going to bring one of the brand-new production Fiat Abarth 500 Sports to the hotel for me to try out.