Yahoo Autos La Squadra x Zagato AGTZ Twin Tail touches the past with a tailcone
Polish supercar dealer La Squadra sells nearly every ultra-exclusive marque an enthusiast could want — Bugatti, Koenigsegg, Pagani, Singer and Autofficina restomods — plus the slightly more accessible Ferrari and even more accessible Maserati. It also sells French brand Alpine, and it hooked up with Zagato to create a special edition Alpine reviving a fascinating moment in the automaker's history. The collaboration came up with the La Squadra x Zagato AGTZ Twin Tail, its party trick right there in the name: Built on an Alpine A110 R, a removable tailcone turns an everyday driver into an aero work of art.
The story starts with the Alpine A220, a prototype sports racer so short-lived and short on results that no one's bothered to make a Wikipedia page for it. Designed to get Alpine into the higher 3.0-liter class at Le Mans in 1968, Aimedee Gordini built a 3.0-liter V8 that was two 1.5-liter four-cylinders from Alpine's A110 Le Mans racer yoked to a single crankcase. When only one of four A220s finished at Le Mans, the previous-generation A210 beat the A220 for class honors, and the A220 suffered reliability issues in nearly every race it entered throughout 1968 and 1969, Alpine pulled the car from endurance racing and walked away from Le Mans to refocus on rallying. It held onto the A220 for a bit longer, cutting 11.8 inches off the tail and entering the racer in tarmac rallies like the Critérium des Cévennes. That wouldn't last long, either, Alpine going back to a renewed A110 to win the 1973 World Rally Championship.
