David passed away November 14th 2016 at the age of 82
I first became aware of Alfa's while competing against them in SCCA races during the 60's and early 70's. There was something about those cars, they were so much more refined than the Austin-Healey and the MGB I drove. So it was in the late 70's I found myself working for Alfa Romeo Inc., longing for the days of racing. By this time I had become an SCCA race official, but I missed the rush of competition. It was then that I decided to begin my search for that "special" car that would return me to my racing roots. What could be more special than an Alfa. So I hit the books, well one book, the Fusi book. "Alfa Romeo, Tutti Le Vetture Dal 1910", the Alfisti bible. Over and over I found myself marking the pages concerning the Giulia Sprint series, more specifically the Giulia Sprint GTA. The story of the GTA is well known among Alfa fans. First introduced in 1965 at the Amsterdam and Geneva car shows it dominated the European Touring Car Championships throughout the early 70's. My search was long, days turned to weeks, weeks to months, finally one day someone told me about a man who might be interested in selling a GTA. It turned out that he had both the Alfa and a Ferrari Dino. His plans were to restore one and sell the other, I was hoping he would sell the Alfa. And so it came to be over a month later the decision to sell the Alfa was made. Behind the Belmont Race Track, tucked in a garage, under some old quilts sat my Alfa Giulia Sprint GTA. The long search was over. The car only ran on two cylinders, needless to say a complete restoration was necessary. Searching for parts became almost as hard as finding the car. I wanted the car to look exactly as it did in 1966, and any old parts just wouldn't do. It was during this time of extensive research that I coined the phrase "archeological engineering". Today if you look under the hood you will see an original GTA radiator, oil cooler, air box, oil recuperator tank, and if conditions allow, you'll see the Sebring side outlet exhaust. In addition to all that it has an 8-plug cylinder head and tubular exhaust headers. For the real enthusiasts, like me, you can get down and look up under the rear end and see the "Sliding Block" rear axle locating system, devised by Ingegnere Carlo Chiti of Autodelta. Remarkably, the odometer reads only 37,272 kms (23,109 miles) after 38 years.
