ALFA ROMEO VS BMW | The History of this Long Rivalry!
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- Опубликовано: 9 фев 2025
- This is a different type of upload from my usual content. In this video I go over the long history of Alfa Romeo and BMW's rivalry in the European automotive field, through both of their sales and market positions, in addition to their battles within motorsports, mainly within various touring car championships. Throughout the video I provide a score board of which car came on top in the decade.
The photographs used in the video are not my own, and the Narration is done utilising AI tools. However, the writing and every other aspect of the video (including the gathering of these photos) was done completely by me. 
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I think the 50’s Alfas were technologically way ahead of BMW. The 50’s and 60’s Alfa was at another level. In the 70’s while BMW clawed back, from an engineering point of view Alfa were ahead. From the 80’s onwards until the 2015 Giulia BMW dominated. Overall BMW’s brand management has been impeccable while Alfa has been mismanaged a heck of a lot. Whenever they had adequate investment and proper management Alfa surged ahead. I was a BMW guy until I drove my first Alfa in 2001! 😊
Agreed! 👍
Alfa Romeo is the one brand for all collectors who are passionate about driving: from the young man who loves his $4000 147 to the tycoon who brings his $20 million 8c 2900 (considered the best sports car in the world between the 2 wars) to Pebble Beach.
Other cars age, Alfas become vintage
@studiocalder818 This is very true! There is an alfa romeo for everyone, and each one is immensely lovable!
Grande alfa romeo
bmw is not a sport car at all... m6 is about 2 tons, it's too heavy...it's for people who want to seem brutal, that's psyho.. Alfa Romeo is a pure sport car, see 4C, for example.
A strange comparison between the 2 companies as it focuses sometimes on motorsport results while on other periods on sales figures and other cases on build quality.
I think the first decade we can speak about real rivalry is the 70's and in the 80's it almost finishes.
It's pretty strange how the 1940's MM victory put the BMW to the podium for the decade as this was the only achievement BMW can show while Alfa despite having dominant in the previous decade and continue winning after WWII not only in TC races but on the GP-races as well.
Then comes to the 50's. The video put the mere 250 examples hand-built luxury car with a 3.2-litre OHV V8 engine as the example of BMW's production line without any major motorsport success and the inferior model lineup was only saved by a tiny Italian microcar's licence production. In the same decade Alfa still produced its pre-war rooted 6C models like the Villa d'Este but successfully started its more public focused models starting the decade with the 1900 series and in the middle with the Giulietta series. All featuring DOHC engines with the Giulietta became alloy block for the first time for a mass produced car. On the field of motorsport Alfa Romeo still dominated the first 2 seasons of the F1 as the follow up for the GP-races. But they didn't develop a new car for the next era as they efforts successfully went into the production cars and were competing in lower classes of touring car scene.
In the 60's he make a draw between the 2 but in reality it is still a far advantage on Alfa's side. The Neue Klasse was a great achievement from BMW's side, reestablishment and a great laydown of a new prospect for the company. But in itself it wasn't the sport sedan it in reality the Alfa Romeo Giulia was. The Neue Klasse was a sportier approach to the mid-tier category. In that decade Alfa ruled the TC scene in the 1300 and 1600 category and returned to the WEC as well with some success.
Now we have reached the 70's when the real rivalry arrives. BMW successfully challenging in the TC class the ageing Giulia platform and finally building a complete range of cars and pushing itself against Mercedes but on a sportier basis. While Alfa extended its product range downwards again with the Alfasud as the Italian state wanted to give job opportunity to the poorer south regions and also offer an affordable a model for the wider masses. But Alfa still stand strong in motorsport, winning 2 titles in the prototype (or WEC) championship, returning to F1 and still competing in TC and rallying.
In the 80's the Alfa came to a big collapse which finally led to the takeover by Fiat at the end of 1986. However they were still strong in motorsport in the first half of the decade the signs of declination showed up. But the GTV6 still was able to rule the TC scene almost everywhere it entered into the championships. And that was the time when its technical advantage and superiority came to an end. The other manufacturers reached and from then on surpassed it in many ways. The lack of financial background made the company's biggest fall back. That combined with the new Fiat ownership led to a less appealing era of group-platform vehicles instead of state of the art genuine solutions of the past decades.
So I think it was less a rivalry then a shift from Alfa to BMW for a niche in car companies as the sporty trendsetter for their time and the real shift happened in the mid-80s when the old Alfetta-platform showed its age while BMW presented the E30 series where Alfa had nothing to come up with other than a redesigned Alfetta derivative the Alf 75, still having the same underpinnings, including the chassis of the Giulietta Nuova.
Nice video. But is it about sales success or better cars? If it’s the latter, Alfa wins.
@@DavidM-mb1vx It is mainly about which brand had the more fulfilled decade when comparing the achievements!
Both brands are great within their own boundaries. I've been driving BMW's starting in 1974 and I'm still happy driving them. Both brands have an enormous group of followers. Best regards to all Alfa Romeo drivers.
The time has already started that people are taking their 70's, 80's and 90's car's out of garage's they've been lying in for year's to put back on the road for every day use, not only are they more enjoyable to drive, but in a lot of way's are more reliable and owner's can do a lot of work of the car's themselves. Modern car's have become too complicated with sensor's and other problems showing up every other day and have to go to a mechanic to be connected to a computer and modern cars have become so boring to drive. Just like a lot of other thing's in life, motoring is being ruined by the lawmakers with their overboard regulation (ruination) of everything that's good.
Just discovered your channel and subscribed. Really enjoyed this! I'm a fan of the current Giulia and Stelvio; I think the former has easily been one of the best-looking sedans on the market in recent years. I hope you get around to covering mighty V-8 powered "Italian-American hybrids" like the Mangusta, Pantera, Intermeccanica and Iso Grifo sometime. The Pantera's been a favorite of mine since first noticing a yellow-orange one regularly parked around my neighborhood as a kid. (Near what was then a video and pinball arcade, can you get more '80s than that?) Even then in the early 1980s you didn't see them every day. Nothing sounds like a 351 with headers in that splendid DeTomaso body. Thanks again, now off to watch your compilation of Italian car commercials.
@AMCmachine Thank you so much for the support, I greatly appreciate it! I'll definitely love to make a video on all the American-engined exotic Italian cars! There are many to cover, and there is so much history behind them and their brands! My personal favourite is the Grifo, and the monteverdi of that counts 😅
@@ItalianAutomotiveLove Thanks for the reply! The Chrysler-powered Swiss Monteverdis are a cool lesser-known example of American muscle powered European sports cars. There's an Italian connection there as well; I think Peter Monteverdi was of Swiss-Italian heritage and some Italian designers like Frua were involved with their models. The Hemi-powered Monteverdi Hai might have made a fierce competitor to the Pantera had it gone into production.
La M1 era più italiana che tedesca...😊
Correct
E l'Isetta! 😁
😊 Very enjoyable to watch
Molto piacevole da guardare
B.M.W/ALFA ROMEO 🙏🙏❤❤😊😊
I love Alfa, but to be true, Alfa today cant‘t reach BMW in any Segment! Sad….😞
Das stimmt was du sagst....
Wenn ALFA die gleiche Ambitionen wie BMW heutzutage haben würden,
wäre ein ALFA doppelte so teuer wie ein BMW.........
Idk i have giulia 2.2 jtd and g20 320 d. Giulia is better for driving and maitence, and looks better. Bmw era is 80 s and 90 s beautyfull cars with bulletproof engines after 2005 to much problems with engines, rust, etc
Neither brand will survive. They have gotten so expensive due to being crammed with technology that the average guy working a normal job can not afford either anymore. The 3 series was supposed to be a daily driver for everybody. Now it is something that rich people and criminals use to show off their status. Alfas are extremely expensive to maintain, and BMWs are no better. The worst part is that they want to rip off their customers with things like subscriptions for heated seats. That will come back to bite them. I will still be driving my 1985 BMW 325i when they have both gone bankrupt due to their shortsightedness, and it will be a sad day.
They were not everybody and a normal job person car, especially Alfa