The long-awaited Alfa Romeo Tonale is here. Its creators took the best cars from their own history and transformed them into a single model. The most beautiful Alpha is back, and AutoLive is here with her story.
I must admit: this article is something very special for me. I waited a long time for the Tonale show and when I saw the first real photos recently, I gasped. I knew that this model was extremely important to Alfa and that the Italians would do anything to succeed. Still, we couldn’t shake the impression that the SUV was a bit unworthy as a lifeline for the sports brand. But Tonale broke this impression completely.
Respectively, it smashed to the ground, threw it off the fifth floor and stomped down with gusto. From the photos, the perfectly mixed essence of all the DNA that has accompanied Alfa Romeo since time immemorial has looked at me. Take the best this brand has ever made, put it together, throw away prejudice and avoid sentiment – and Tonale will be in front of you. At first, second and any other good. Did you love 8C, Brera, or Giulia? Or maybe 156GTA? Here they are all together, complete.
Metamorphosis. It is no coincidence that this is one of the key slogans for the entire Tonale project. Dictionary of foreign words: transformation / transformation. A more concise word could not be found. The short video we enclose below shows what transformation and transformation the creators were inspired to create and why Tonale looks as stunning as it looks. Unlike Stelvia, who is a bit like Giulia on stilts, Tonale went in a completely different direction. I’m not afraid to say now that it worked out.
Under the hood: Busso will no longer be, but it’s still Alpha
So let’s get this wrong: as can be seen from the title, we will simply not see the motoring orgasms that the legendary six-cylinder Busso could evoke. What a payoff. “Bébel,” or Jean Paul Belmondo, would comment, “Times are bad, Kamil.” And he would be right. All these emission restrictions and allowance burns lead carmakers to produce engines that they don’t want either and that we, the users of their products, don’t want either. A special time.
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And with Alfa, this is a hundredfold. Where else have you enjoyed the engines than here? Well, um, you were mostly happy. Tonale avoided all the extremes that could distance him from Cuore Sportivo, or the sports heart and chose two hybrids of 130/160 horses (otherwise it is no longer possible today, greetings to Brussels) and one plug-in hybrid 275 horses / 4 × 4. That doesn’t sound bad. For highway pilots, the trio is complemented by a classic 130-horsepower diesel. Uff. It could have been a worse lineup.
Interior: The Alfists will be at home. And not only them.
Alfa’s interior quite accurately copies its exterior – it’s as imaginative as it is bold and to the right extent combines traditional elements of AR with modern technologies. For example, the dashboard seems to have fallen out of sight of all the classic “pipes” that most Alfa owners know intimately – however, they hide the LCD panel behind them. But so tasteful that it will always amaze you – and a hundred times more elegant than those classic LCD rectangles from ordinary cars. Italian fashion? Looks like it.
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In conclusion? Alpha, like Lancia, is fighting for survival. Both are brands with a number of legendary models and a number of successes, starting with Alfa 33, 75, 155 or 164 and ending with Lancia Thema or Delta Integrale. Who remembers today when the aforementioned Integrale in the war colors of Martini won one event of the World Rally Championship after another… So I wish Alfa Tonale, who, by the way, is just as lucky and successful as Stelvio, named after a pass in northern Italy!
Do you think that Alfa Romeo and Lancia will be able to save and bring back to profits?
