The super-stripped out Alpine A110 R, the final iteration of the car before the launch of an Alpine electric sports car, has gone on sale with a £89,990 starting price.
Called the A110 R – for ‘radical’ – it has been devised as a no-compromise, circuit-oriented plaything heavily inspired by Alpine’s involvement in motorsport.
Sitting above the entry-level A110, mid-rung GT and stiffened S, the R completes the core A110 family. It is joined by a £129,440 Fernando Alonso edition – limited to just 32 units – which gets a unique colour scheme and bespoke tuning to celebrate the career of the Formula 1 icon.
However, bosses have not disclosed whether further variants could arrive before the sports car goes electric in 2026.
With hot laps at the top of its agenda, it weighs just 1082kg – down 34kg on the “already very light” A110 S and lighter, even, than the latest iteration of the 2.0-litre Mazda MX-5. It has achieved most of its weight loss through the use of carbon parts plus some specialist tyres, she explained.
Mass has been shed chiefly by the fitment of lighter bucket seats, the removal of noise insulation from the engine bay, the swapping of the glass rear panel for an aluminium item and the use of carbon fibre for the bonnet, wheels and new-shape rear ‘window’ panel.
But it’s the enhanced focus on dynamic agility that marks the R out most obviously from its stablemates. In consultation with Alpine’s Formula 1 engineers at Enstone, the team at Les Ulis has created a much more purposeful aero package, while overhauling the chassis for maximum stiffness and response.
The new swan-neck spoiler, rear diffuser, flat undercarriage, flat front wheel-face designs and reshaped side skirts combine to boost downforce (by up to 29kg at top speed over the A110 S) and reduce drag (by 5% in Track mode) for both a higher top speed and greater stability in corners.
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Lots of people on you tube pretending they are car enthusiats when really they are trying to do is inflate the market, I've said this before, the global car markets have enough wealthy people in it that a company such as Renault is now selling 2 door cars for £130,000.
£130k, Just how many special editions can Renault bring out out before running out of punters, 90k, you've still only got at heart a 1.8 4 pot from a Meganne with ropy auto box only. No wonder I've only ever seen one.
At least it makes the base version good value and more palatable but at the end of the day Lotus and Porsche won't be losing sleep.
Bought my Alpine A110 on the back of my tuning company writing off my much modified and much track day used Cayman GT4. Matt Prior's glowing reports of the Life 110 modified car led me in that direction. My initial drive on track of my A110 at Thruxton led me to phone the Alpine Dealer and ask if they would buy the car back from me , as it's dynamics were so alarming on that circuit. The Dealer refused and so a call to David Pook of Life 110 began a host of track orientated modifications. Now my car is a complete delight, both on road and on track , it's lost the very French ride , but it's still comfortable , it feels a little more "German" in ride terms , but coming from a GT4 that not a problem. There are so many super fast expensive track day cars these days , lack of straight line performance is not an issue , I was seeing an indicated 140 mph before braking on the Hanger Straight at Silverstone a couple of weeks ago , where any sort of McLaren is seeing 170 mph at least , but from a driving enjoyment perspective this really doesn't matter at all, the overall handling and braking are a complete delight, and this is mostly brought about by the Alpine's commendable light weight, and adoption of slightly wider wheels with Cup 2 tyres, Life 110's excellent suspention modifications, which include geometry, springs, anti roll bars and some really fantastic, but costly R53 Dampers. The end of the track day season came a little too soon for me to test Life's new CFD designed rear wing and larger front brake rotor modifications, which if the testing figures provided by Life are to believed will provide another incremental improvement to the car. All of these modifications have come at a small fraction of the price of buying an A110R and add a bit of British innovation to the car which for me is very pleasing . Added to all this is a little bonus which for many will be irrelevant but for me as a once very poor boy is very pleasing, on any run at sensible road speeds 44 mpg is completely realistic.
Finally to Peter, thank you for letting us know your health condition, my congratulations on bringing up your family despite this , keep up the excellent and interesting posts , and if you ever fancy attending a track day as a passenger to a reasonably competent geriatric, I'd be delighted to invite you as my guest , I'm sure the offices of Autocar could put us in touch ?