Abarth-Fiat 1000GT Spider by Pininfarina

In the battle of large versus small car, small car will lose almost every time.

What to do, now, then, when those who are most able to buy cars like the Abarth-Fiat 1000GT Spider by Pininfarina are million-and-billionaires who are so busy accumulating wealth that they can’t afford the possible consequences of driving it?

Increasingly, paying homage to cars in other people’s collections is what car content online has become, and I write this not as a discussion pitting the Haves versus Have-Nots, but more as a conversation about what it means for car enthusiasts, content creators, and the service industry going forward.

To the scenario above, if you value seat time and want to see interesting cars up close, your lot in life is to find a job in the auto sales and service industries. The mechanic, the handlers will often put more miles on certain cars in a collection simply by virtue of the work they require, and the timing of an eternal buy–keep–sell cycle.

The ol’ “You can drive my car, but wax it first…”

A notion that only the wealthy are effective stewards of automotive history and gems such as this Abarth is preposterous — who do you think actually buys, sells, services, and documents these cars, similarly wealthy people? 

Obviously not.

We have created this scenario where honouring automotive history is skipping over the best part of a car: driving it.

Like pulling a vintage film camera off the shelf and exposing a few rolls, the experience of collector cars is rapidly becoming a deeply personal, ever-more-truncated, lower and lower mileage experience, fully doomed to a life between being entombed, laid bare as the centrepiece of a large room, or lawn art to be pushed from concours to concours.

The engine in this car is no hyper-exotic thing: it’s from a tiny Fiat 850 economy car, treated to a hot metal massage of sorts from skilled Abarth technicians.

(A day in the shop having Abarth tune-up parts fitted is a spa for Fiats, if you think about it.)

Here, no roof, no superfluous styling, no large wheels or exotic tires. Little competition provenance, nothing to write home about in the way of victories or records. Its engine is modified by Abarth, yes, however it surely has fewer parts than a modern Dyson vac.

There isn’t complexity of any sort that would warrant, say, a team of technicians with laptops (like a classic Formula 1, rally, or endurance racing car does).

Cars like this, then, are valuable, because of what they don’t include?

When the Abarth-Fiat 1000GT Spider by Pininfarina debuted at the 1964 Turin Motor Show, it was pride of place among a small fleet of hot-for-the-time Abarth sports cars.

This is important to note, because it has a (near) 1-litre engine. It makes 54 horsepower, and it was allegedly capable of speeds around 180 km/h (112 mph), which is admittedly quite a lot. 

To get to these figures, the car weighs only 635 kg (1,400 lbs).

It’s tiny, and fragile, and lovely. Pininfarina’s Aldo Brovarone is responsible for this gem.

Anyway, reality: in a frontal crash against a modern vehicle of any sort, occupants in a 1000GT Spider would pose their last breath in the style of a Jackson Pollock painting. Thrilling, no?

For these concepts, one spider (1964) and one coupe (1965) were produced; the coupe survives but I have not been able to figure out what happened to the Spider.

As always, please leave a comment below if you have more information on this car!

READ NEXT: “Abarth 1000 Pininfarina. A serious attempt to reach the American market” by Miguel Sánchez at en.escuderia.com.