Zoom Zoom Faza
Fiat at Lime Rock 2019
FAZA was a longtime Fiat Abarth shop founded by a race-winning eccentric you've never heard of.
Abarth tuned Fiats. FAZA tuned Abarths. FAZA was a small shop and race team founded in the early Sixties in upstate New York, consisting of little more than its founder, one Albert S. Cosentino, and Kuro-san, a black labrador retriever. Cosentino claimed a personal connection with Carlo Abarth himself, as well as good relationships with Fiat-adjacent companies like Campagnolo, Alquati, and Collotti. If you threaded your Fiat through a sea of Biscaynes and Galaxies, you had Al's phone number written down: for the small but dedicated Fiat tifosi in America, he was a lifeblood to the motherland, a source of only the rarest go-fast kits. FAZA, incidentally, stood for Fiat Abarth Zagato Allemano and therefore combines some of the most mellifluous words in automobildom. And the shop existed to prop up one of the most storied careers in SCCA history.
Carlo Abarth could wring shocking amounts of power from the littlest Fiat engines. And FAZA, with Cosentino behind the wheel, could race them to remarkable success. In SCCA's D Sedan class, Cosentino won 34 out of 35 races with a Fiat Abarth 1000TC Berlina Corsa. Behind the wheel of FAZA-prepared Fiat 600 Abarths, and later X-1/9s, the team dominated. He worked with Fiat to develop the X1/9 Abarth Prototipo, or what could have been the World Rally Championship car to replace the 124 Abarth; when Fiat destroyed its prototypes, Al kept his.
"51 NATIONAL WINS IN OUR FIRST 53 RACES," proclaimed the ad copy, a triumph oft-proclaimed by keepers of the FAZA flame. We did a little fact checking behind this lofty claim. Indeed, Cosentino did finish second in the National Runoffs in 1968 and 1970, along with a third-place finish in 1966. But that claim of 51 wins? We're not sure.
Zoom Zoom Faza
Fiat at Lime Rock 2019
FAZA was a longtime Fiat Abarth shop founded by a race-winning eccentric you've never heard of.
Abarth tuned Fiats. FAZA tuned Abarths. FAZA was a small shop and race team founded in the early Sixties in upstate New York, consisting of little more than its founder, one Albert S. Cosentino, and Kuro-san, a black labrador retriever. Cosentino claimed a personal connection with Carlo Abarth himself, as well as good relationships with Fiat-adjacent companies like Campagnolo, Alquati, and Collotti. If you threaded your Fiat through a sea of Biscaynes and Galaxies, you had Al's phone number written down: for the small but dedicated Fiat tifosi in America, he was a lifeblood to the motherland, a source of only the rarest go-fast kits. FAZA, incidentally, stood for Fiat Abarth Zagato Allemano and therefore combines some of the most mellifluous words in automobildom. And the shop existed to prop up one of the most storied careers in SCCA history.
Carlo Abarth could wring shocking amounts of power from the littlest Fiat engines. And FAZA, with Cosentino behind the wheel, could race them to remarkable success. In SCCA's D Sedan class, Cosentino won 34 out of 35 races with a Fiat Abarth 1000TC Berlina Corsa. Behind the wheel of FAZA-prepared Fiat 600 Abarths, and later X-1/9s, the team dominated. He worked with Fiat to develop the X1/9 Abarth Prototipo, or what could have been the World Rally Championship car to replace the 124 Abarth; when Fiat destroyed its prototypes, Al kept his.
"51 NATIONAL WINS IN OUR FIRST 53 RACES," proclaimed the ad copy, a triumph oft-proclaimed by keepers of the FAZA flame. We did a little fact checking behind this lofty claim. Indeed, Cosentino did finish second in the National Runoffs in 1968 and 1970, along with a third-place finish in 1966. But that claim of 51 wins? We're not sure.