Lancia Stratos: The Most Audacious Lie in Racing History episode artwork

EPISODE · Jun 4, 2026 · 27 MIN

Lancia Stratos: The Most Audacious Lie in Racing History

from The Car Nerd with Jason Hassett · host Hassett Studios

The Lancia Stratos didn't just change rallying; it completely broke the concept of homologation. In the early 1970s, the dirt roads of the World Rally Championship were dominated by modified family sedans—until a wedge-shaped spaceship from Bertone landed in Turin.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━📚 ORDER MY NEW BOOK "History Written by Losers" — out now. The true story of global power has been whitewashed by the victors and the fixers. This book tells the side of history they tried to bury. 👉 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GP9TKPBH━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━🏎️ IN THIS EPISODEIn 1971, the Lancia Stratos HF prototype arrived to replace the aging Fulvia and change motorsport engineering forever. Within three years, it had rewritten the rulebook and established a terrifying dominance in Group 4. In this video, we dive into the radical genius of the Stratos and the behind-the-scenes negotiations it took to bring it to life. From Marcello Gandini's razor-sharp design to the desperate struggle to secure Ferrari engines, we explore how the Stratos became the first purpose-built rally car and why corporate politics ultimately forced a champion into an early grave.What’s inside:The homologation loophole: Cesare Fiorio and the quest for a bespoke rally weapon.The technical edge: Bertone's wedge, a microscopic wheelbase, and the mid-mounted Ferrari Dino V6.The Maranello standoff: Why Enzo Ferrari deliberately stalled on delivering the engines.The corporate betrayal: How Fiat killed an undefeated legend just to sell the 131 family sedan.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━🔗 LINKS & SUPPORT📚 The book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GP9TKPBH📺 Documentary channel: https://youtube.com/@thatjasonhassett🔔 Subscribe for weekly post-mortems on the cars, companies, and engineering decisions that shaped modern motoring.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━#LanciaStratos #Group4Rally #MarcelloGandini #CesareFiorio #FerrariDino #WRC #TheCarNerd #CarHistory #AutomotiveHistory #Bertone #RallyLegend

Episode metadata supplied by the publisher feed · Published Jun 4, 2026

Embed this episode

NOW PLAYING

Lancia Stratos: The Most Audacious Lie in Racing History

0:00 27:21

No transcript for this episode yet

We transcribe on demand. Request one and we'll notify you when it's ready — usually under 10 minutes.

No similar episodes found.

No similar podcasts found.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long is this episode of The Car Nerd with Jason Hassett?

This episode is 27 minutes long.

When was this The Car Nerd with Jason Hassett episode published?

This episode was published on June 4, 2026.

Can I download this The Car Nerd with Jason Hassett episode?

Yes. Use the download control on the episode player to save the publisher-provided media file.
URL copied to clipboard!