Don’t ask how it happened, but last weekend I took three Fiat 500s to the pub.
In fact three of us took one each to a pub, had a swift half, swapped, drove to another pub, swapped again and drove home. All were early ‘60s suicide door examples, all still sporting crash gearboxes and 500 engines one or more of which might have been developing something close to the full 18bhp.
I can’t remember when I last pulled up outside a boozer almost (but not quite) helpless with laughter, but I should do it more often. Of course part of it was the sheer incongruity of both the number and type of transport in use but in the main it was simply the fun we’d had on the way. We were able to drive these little rear-engined mini-masterpieces as fast as it was possible to make them go without once even looking like we might be troubling a speed limit.
My proudest moment came driving the red one which I’d been told had the best engine and using it to sail past the blue one which was pretty slow, even by Fiat 500 standards. Only then, as a sharp downhill right hove into view, did I remember the red one also had by far the most inept suspension of the three and my attempt to get it sufficiently slowed and turned in briefly brought to mind images of squirming early Porsche 917s trying to slow for Mulsanne while travelling almost exactly 200mph faster than me.
On the way home, this time in the white one, which had been properly set up and was just too easy by comparison, it occurred to me that amid all this jolliness lay a serious point. We’d actually been driving other cars all day, cars with proper performance and point-to-point pace and the Fiats were intended merely as petit fours to round off the day. In the event, and once they were safely back in the garage and we were nursing something slightly stronger, the three of us agreed it was the little 500s that had been the unexpected stars of the show.
Of course a lot of this is owed to Dante Giacosa and the team that designed the timeless 500. More fun to drive than a Mini, better looking and quicker through town, it is my favourite small car. But even he could not have predicted the traffic conditions of the early 21st century and how that would play into the 500’s hands. It’s not fun despite being slow, it’s fun because it’s slow. If you drive a 500 as fast as it will go, it will just about keep up with the normal flow in traffic. Which means all you need to do is wait for a gap in that traffic and because you’ll neither gain on the cars ahead, nor will those behind gain on you, you might as well have the road to yourself. And should you slowly catch a car in front, don’t bother trying to overtake because unless it’s another 500 with a sick engine, it won’t be possible. Instead hang back for a couple of minutes and buy yourself another chunk of traffic free road.
Do not mistake me, very fast cars like the Ferrari F12 I wrote about last week will always have their place both on road and track and for a two-week driving holiday in Europe it would be near enough peerless. But for 20-minute country lane trip to the pub, the bar has been set by an arthritic Fiat 500 with dodgy rear suspension. It will take a surprising amount to beat it.
As usual, how right your are Andrew. Just a wonderful little car; but the real story behinds this is the fact that you just can’t drive around our roads as fast as current perfomance cars can achieve. I have have owned cars like a Carrera GT, 599, etc, and I have kicked them all into touch to buy a rather nice old E Type. Fun with a capital “F” but about as fast as our traffic filled roads will allow.
Absolutely spot on. See also: Citroen 2cv. My current daily drive is a 1982 Citroen Dyane with a very tired engine and quite a lot of rust. But coming home from work at 4 in the morning on the twisty rural A road I have the good fortune to commute along, it’s tremendous. The trick to driving cars like this properly is basically, never slow down for anything (other than 30mph limits). I could probably achieve more comfortable motoring much cheaper, but I’d struggle to find anything half as much fun.
I had a white Fiat 500, just like yours here, suicide doors and all. It is the only car I ever made money on. Nothing went wrong in 12 months motoring when I was a lad of 22. I bought it to replace a Lotus Elan which I blew all my 21st birthday money on and ran until I was broke. From the sublime to the ridiculous. Much as I loved the Lotus, the Fiat was more fun and more dependable. I must add though I replaced the 500 with a 2cv which was even better – brush painted in lime green, all 602cc with 6 volt electrics. Never could make it go fast enough to worry about the dim headlights. Oh, the good old days ….
Had one ‘in the day’ & won every traffic light GP in London, also dropped a valve on the M1! An MG Midget currently lets me enjoy the lanes without annoying others.
Right on the money as usual Andrew. Best fun is usually had in cheapest cars. The only car I have had which ever even came near the 500 was a later 128. Very cheap and horribly unreliable – eg points that would not stay open in a horizontal shaft distributor – you couldn’t do the points without dropping the screws onto the road – but when it went it had a sublime combination of fantastic handling and very little grip – wonderful fun on Scottish border roads
Well put Andrew, a proper thrash is a proper thrash no matter what the mount. I recall drifting a 1964 Ford station wagon loaded to the gunnels with baskets of iced sweet corn bound for market through the swerving lanes which bisected a local golf course, Summer 1967. Was a mess to unload with corn ears everywhere but the memory always brings a smile to my face!
Exactly the philosophy on which our ‘Disastro Grippagio’* Moto Club’ is founded. Six to ten middle aged men, exploring tight back roads all over Europe on 60′s and 70′s sports two stroke bikes of less than 100cc. More fun than you can imagine, never was the racing line more important! All multi-big bike owners, we’re all agreed this is the way forward for entertainment, even when you factor in stretching of the ‘regs’…..
*derived from the propensity of said bikes to expire in Italy