The Lancia brand has very much slipped into obscurity for most of us so it's easy to forget when Lancia was on top of the world. From the mid-'70s to the early-'90s, Lancia racked up an impressive tally of international race wins and championships with its Stratos and then Montecarlo successor. Now, a fascinating Lancia has come up for sale on an American internet auction website: A genuine Lancia LC2 Group C racecar.
In 1983, Lancia rolled out the LC2, a closed-cockpit Group C car co-developed with Ferrari. It was set to rival the legendary Porsche 956, and later the 962, with a big power advantage courtesy of the dual-turbocharged Ferrari V8 in the engine bay. Its crazy 720 horsepower helped the LC2 win a string of pole positions, but the car's weakness would be reliability. It did win a few races for Lancia from 1983-1986, and continued to run in privateer campaigns until the early '90s, but Lancia ultimately dropped out of sportscar racing altogether at the end of 1986 in order to concentrate on rallying. The Lancia Delta went on to be one of the most successful rally cars in history, but the LC2 remained the jewel of Lancia's rise to glory in international sportscar racing.
The LC2 now available is chassis number 2 of just 5 ever built. It ran under the works Martini livery from '83-'86 scoring a win at the Imola 1000K in 1983 at the hands of Teo Fabi and Hans Heyer. Bob Wollek and Alessandro Nannini drove the car to a fastest lap after winning the pole at Le Mans in '84. It finished 8th in that 24 hour run, but followed up with a 246-mile-per-hour Mulsanne Straight clocking the following year when it qualified P3 and finished 6th. Chassis number 002 ran in more races than any other LC2 before retiring in 1986. Riccardo Patrese, Michele Alboreto, Mauro Baldi and Lucio Cesario were the other drivers who got a drive in Chassis 002 before it was sold off to a private buyer in 1988.
Recently 4,000 hours and $350,000 USD has been put into a 100-point restoration of the car and the price now is a whopping $1,250,000 USD. That might seem like a lot of money for a racecar that only achieved one win and never totally lived up to its promise, but it's not likely another LC2 will be cheaper or on sale anytime soon.
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