2007 Fiat Punto Abarth

There are few things in motoring more appealing than a small, fast Italian car, and this new Grande Punto Abarth is one of the best ever.

All the ingredients are there: 1.4-litre turbocharged engine, light and sparky and free-revving and developing 155bhp, tight, well- honed chassis, good looks and plenty of chirpy Latin character. If you love cars, there's no way you could help but love a Punto Abarth, that's the bottom line.
The engine's powerful for a 1.4, but more importantly, it's torquey: 152 lb ft at 5000rpm, which increases to 170 lb ft at 3000rpm when you press the Sport Boost button in the middle of the dash. It's a good, useful button, that, firming up the steering at the same time. It transforms the nature of the car, with all of that boost punching in at lower revs.It really nails you into the seat: the 0-62mph time is 8.2secs, which is fairly brisk, and it's easy to zap through the six speed box because the change is quick and precise.

Throw it at a corner and the fun continues. There seems to be no understeer whatever, and the advantage of having such a small, light engine up front is obvious once you start changing direction in a manic fashion. You can turn the stability control system off, but it's never fully off, giving the fairly young potential buyers of this car a safety net. Idiotic hard-heads will be moaning at this, but it's a good idea - you can still have plenty of 'dorifto' fun before it cuts in.

So that's the standard Abarth - and then there's the Abarth Essesse kit. For Essesse (pronounced essay-essay) read 'SS' or Super Sport. That gives you a full 180bhp and 200lb ft of torque. Nice - it's a properly fast car and it's definitely the option to go for, judging by my brief run in a prototype. Expect prices to start at around £13K, with about £4K more for the SS, when the Grande Punto Abarth goes on sale early next year. That sounds like a proper bargain to me.

© Source: topgear
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