irishcar.com ALFA ROMEO ARCHIVES
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146

Alfa 146 Junior is a taste you get fond of (Mar 99) - Brian Byrne

147

The Hannibal Run (Dec 00)
“You must all be out of your minds to have come on this,” Alfa Romeo Ireland PR manager Joe Gantly told us when we reached the half-way point of an amazing journey from Naples to London. So writes Brian Byrne. Along with a number of other Irish motoring journalists (including colleague Tony Conlon above), he took on the terrors of a wet and speeding phalanx of Italian drivers in a journey across the Alps. full story


Giving the Alfa 147 'a good lash' (Feb 01)
I missed the famous Hannibal Run in which Irish journalists participated to bring home the Alfa Romeo 147, writes Eddie Cunningham. So you can imagine my delight when I got the opportunity to drive the new European Car of the Year here before anyone else. I immediately decided I'd do my own Hannibal Run - down through Kildare, Wicklow and Wexford and back again to Dublin - and that was just for starters. full story


Alfa 147 takes us to history around every corner (jun 01)
If there is a reason needed to go to Italy, Alfa Romeo are the people to come up with one, writes Brian Byrne. And this time, for Irish journalists anyhow, the reason was the addition of two new doors to the I47. And the freedom to properly try it out on the fast coast road up to Tarquinia showed that the car has the brio we come to expect from Alfa. Full Story.

156

A brace of new Alfas (May 00) - Brian Byrne

Style never went out of fashion (Aug 00) - Tony Conlon

Alfa's anti-estate (Nov 00) - Gerry Boud

Alfa 156 2.5 is a desirable vehicle for little sins (Apr 98) - Brian Byrne

Beauty and the Best (Nov 00) - Gerry Boud

The Alfa 156 1.6 widens the reach (mar 01) - Gerry Boud

Alfa JTS is a day's indulgence (Aug 02)
Most times in this job, a car review is based on a period of time living with the car in daily work and then writing about it on that basis, writes Brian Byrne. Somehow, that didn’t seem the right thing to do with Alfa’s latest 156, the 2-litre JTS. A blue car, wild blue yonder, and we were without much difficulty convinced that it was a day to beat the blues. Even imaginary blues.

Alfa GTA is a trust in the pilot, and the car (Apr 02)
There are times when I just trust people absolutely, writes Brian Byrne. Like the pilot who’s lifting my plane off the runway, who I figure wants as much to make it as successful a takeoff as I do. And like the professional race drivers who sometimes take me around racetracks at speeds which are far beyond my ability, in order to show me just how far their cars can be pushed. Full Story.



Sexy Alfa diesel (Mar 04)
The true heart of every Alfa Romeo is in its engine, writes Trish Whelan, and Fiat have injected the 156 with a new lease of life with the introduction of the Multi Jet diesel engine which they expect will increase sales of the 156 by up to one-third.

166

Alfa 166 with more going for it (Nov 01)
Perhaps the biggest problem with the Alfa Romeo 166 is that it suffers from comparison with its smaller and decidedly more elegant siblings, the 156 and the 147, writes Donal Byrne. Where both the latter are capable of turning the heads of any age group - especially the 156 - the 166 presents a far more muscular and mature profile. It is interesting to see how the latest version of the 166 - the 2.0 litre TS Sportivo - fares when trying to set pulses racing a little faster. Full Story.


GTV

Big-engined GTV an unbelievable experience (Nov 00) - Gerry Boud

The world's an Alfa stage (Jun 03)
Alfa's 'sexy' themes have been carried by the GTV and its top-down stablemate the Spider, writes Brian Byrne. The latest iterations of both cars are upgrades rather than totally new vehicles, because, Alfa say, there was 'no need' to change the current styling drastically.

SPIDER

Alfa GTA has WOW! factor
Dynamic stuff. Superbly shaped and moulded. Sexy as it stood there in its coat of bright red, writes Trish Whelan. And with all those 250 horses just raring to be let loose. You can really hear every one of them when you let it rev up high. It can’t be driven to its full potential or you’d be knee deep in speeding tickets, or worse .... it’s a car that really belongs on a racing track.