The Zagato Experience

By Pete Vack *
From the Archives, June 2015

As early as the late 1960s, the Alfa enthusiast instinctively knew that of all the post war Alfas semi production cars, the Zagatos were the most desirable. Alfa Zagatos exemplified the era of the relatively inexpensive, coachbuilt GT car, as did the special bodied Ferraris, Maseratis, and Lancias.

They were also, for most part, aluminum, which beat the ever present rust problem associated with steel bodied cars of the era. Unlike the competition, Alfas were more numerous, less expensive and in general more reliable. They had mechanicals that could be understood, repaired and there were ample parts available. Another part of the lure of Alfas was that the 1300/1600 cars were a joy to drive; some, yes, underpowered, but all were fun and easy to drive. They were small, light, responsive and eager. Many were raced successfully at Le Mans, Sebring, and the Targa Florio.

By the early 1980s the word was out and in the first edition of Motorbook International’s “Illustrated Alfa Romeo Guide” (1983) author Joe Benson nailed it correctly. Before the pages were numbered, he placed a photo of the 1300 SV and wrote “This lovely Giulietta Sprint Zagato has it all – style, lightness, grace, and a successful racing legacy. It is the essence of the exotic post-war Alfa.” He then proceeded to give all the SV and TZ variants a top five star rating. Nothing has changed since; time has only served to substantiate the accolades.

One Step Beyond

A the same time, for many of us, the Zagato SVZs, SZs and TZs were one step beyond; even in 1972, always a step further than our finances would allow, and as the years progressed they remained so. If the affordable Alfa 1600 Spider went up in value, the Zagato variants would also increase in value accordingly. And on and on it went and the situation remains the same today as it did forty years ago. In response to our Coda Tronca article, Phil Gicante wrote,
“Would love to have had the experience of owning one of the older SZs. Unfortunately, I don’t think my financial assets will permit expansion of my Alfa Zagato collection beyond the Jr. Z and SZ (ES-30).”

The price of an Alfa TZ1 could be as high as $5000, even in the 1970s; SZs were slightly less but both very hard to find at any price, while a Spider in good condition could be found just about anywhere for around $1000. To put this in perspective, before the inflation of the mid-1970s, a new Ford Pinto was less than $2000, and a new BMW 2002 went for a mere $3600 in 1972. $5000 for a used race car was a a lot of money…one step beyond the pocketbook of most Alfa owners.

Like George Pezold, most guys drove their Zagatos on a daily basis. Bob Little recalls driving from Michigan to Sebring after meeting Tom Tann and Joe Benson. “At the time, they co-owned a blue Alfa Romeo TZ-1. In 1970 Tom and I decided to drive it to Sebring, Florida in a 24 hour non-stop run. I had been invited to be a Pit Marshal for Alec Ulmann’s organization, assigned to the Autodelta team pit area, of course! No one noticed, it was just taken for granted that one could and did drive such cars everywhere.”

Oliver Collins provided these remembrances in a recent email to VeloceToday:

Those were the days (1978) when we didn’t ‘collect’ cars but drove them,” wrote Oliver Collins. When Richard, John and I started the Alfa Romeo Club of Canada in 1975 we all quickly became interested in older Alfas. In those days that was Alfas 10 or 15 years old. I remember dealer Rudy Pas would come to town from the Netherlands and meet us for a beer and let us drool over his binder full of Alfa 1900s, Giuliettas, Giulias, SZs TZs etc for sale until some of us finally made the plunge to purchase some of them. I recall club members bought 2 SZs, a TZ, a 2600 coupe and a 1900PF coupe from him.

John Winter’s SZ Coda Tronca, however, came from California. He flew down with his girlfriend and drove it back, unrestored and sight unseen. On the way he met Richard and I at that year’s national Alfa meet in Snowmass (Aspen), CO and we then drove back to Toronto together, John and Sharon in the SZ, Richard and I in my new GTV. What a trip, 32 hours, non-stop, except for gas, food and a minor transmission leak repair on the SZ. We arrived so tired that Richard and I had to switch drivers every 20 minutes because whoever was driving couldn’t stay awake. Poor John did the whole stint by himself as Sharon didn’t drive. We were within 2 blocks of home at 3:00am when we were pulled over by 2 cops who caught site of the California plates on the SZ.

After the rookie cop pointed out John was breaking the law by driving on those plates which were not his, we said fine give us a ticket and let us go to bed, but he insisted on pulling out his traffic code to show us that he was right. We really didn’t care, just wanted to leave, so finally his partner said ‘let them go they are obviously very tired’. So he did.

When I bought my SZ 062 from Richard (I think for $3500), while it was still in transit crossing the Atlantic, (he had just purchased the TZ), it was without an engine so we put in a Giulia 1600 engine that was handy, while I searched for a more appropriate 1300, never expecting to find an original SZ engine (with higher compression).

I put out ads on the usual Alfa network and only got one reply, from Capt. Ralph Stevens, an Alfa and OSCA aficionado from Main, no longer with us. He said he had a spare he had purchased from Italy and would consider parting with it, but would first check out its history with Alfa’s Archives and let me know. I still remember arriving home late one night and seeing a letter from him sitting on the counter. Anxiously opening it, I was thrilled to read that Alfa Romeo Archives had told him the engine had originally been fitted to SZ chassis 062. It was my original engine! Unbelievable. He closed with, ‘Oliver you must have it!’

*Editor’s note: First, to simplify nomenclature, we will refer t the earlier SZs as ’round tails’. Later clipped tail SZs will be called ‘Coda Troncas’. Second, we limit this series of articles to the 750/101 1300 and 1600 Alfa Zagatos. Therefore there is no discussion of the 1900 Zagatos, the 2600 Zagatos, or the later Jr. Zagatos.