- You guys know about the Fiat 500 Abarth, the hot version of everyone's favorite little drivable puppy, the Fiat 500. It's faster. It looks cooler. It handles better, and it has a fricking scorpion on it. Well, what if I told you that that badge represents one of the
earliest tuners in the world, a race-proven company so influential that its name is Italian slang for strong? Are you ready to expand your mind and join the ranks of the illuminated? Throw up the triangle and get
ready to feel the sting, baby, 'cause it's frickin' scorpion season. This is everything you need to know to get up to speed on Abarth. (upbeat video game music) - [Nolan] Huge thanks to NordVPN for sponsoring today's video. I'm sorry you had to call again. Yes, sir, I'll handle it. Guys, that was Mr. Nord, and he's pretty upset that
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(TV beeps) - All right, so there's
this dude, Carl Abarth, and he's born in Austria in 1908. He moved to Italy as a teenager, changed name to Carlo
and got into motorcycles. All right, big time. As in, he designed and built motorcycles, which is
(bell rings) almost as cool as being a state runner-up in improv and speech
and debate in Kentucky, which is what I was doing as a teenager. (electronic air whooshes)
(crickets chirping) But he wasn't just a motorcycle mechanic. He was also a motorcycle racer. He won his first race when
he was 20 years old on a bike that he designed and built himself. And he did that by himself, like with no fricking pit crew
or support team or anything, so already, this dude is next level. Well, I'm about to throw another
level on top of that level. All right, the next, next level. (video game chime dings) Carlo won the European
Motorcycle Championship the next five years in a row. (bubbles pop) After that, he was like, (in foreign accent) "Racing
other motorcycle is boring. "What else can I race?" How about a train. And I'm not talking about
just any train, all right? This dude raced the best train, the Orient Express. Carlo destroyed that luxurious choo-choo in an 850-mile race across Austria. Abarth was tearing it up on two wheels showing trains who's boss. - [Demonic Man] Flawless victory. - You think you're the
boss, you freaking train? Turns out you're not; I am. Everything was going great. Little did he know that his world was about to change forever. (in distorted voice) Forever. Carlo woke up in a hospital bed in 1939. Doctors told him that
he'd been severely injured in a motorcycle accident and
that he'd never ride again. And then frickin' World War broke out. What is this now? Can we get a break? I'm being robbed of my adulthood. I digress. Everything that Carlo knew
was crumbling around him. I can relate, obviously. Thankfully he had plenty of
time to rethink his plan. He had to stay in that
hospital for a year to recover. He probably thought of all
kinds of plan B options, but one made more sense
than any of the others. Carlo knew that he had
a knack for engineering and a dirty little kink for speed. (object smacking) He just couldn't ride
a motorcycle anymore. I imagine he damaged his taint. And as we established before, he'd already made trains
is (beep) so what's left? Cars. (engine revving) When the war finally ended, Carlo got a job as a design engineer at a brand new car company called Porsche. Then he moved on to an Italian
sports car manufacturer called Cisitalia, which
promptly went bankrupt. It was post-war Europe. So it goes, bummer. But at that point, Carlo
was like, "You know what? "None of these guys ever even beat a train "in a race, okay?"
(motorcycle hums) "I have. "I bet I can run my
own sports car company. "And I bet I can buy
one for pretty cheap." So he bought Cisitalia, and in 1949, he transformed it into Abarth
& C, not Co., all right? Just C. With his race car buddy,
Guido Scagliarini, which sounds racist, but it's his name, who just happened to come
from a very rich family. (cash register dings) Make friends with rich people, guys. Then you make them like the
same stuff that you like. And then you get to do that stuff. Carlo's idea for Abarth & C
was to apply his motorcycle, hot rodding skills to develop aftermarket go-fast parts for cars. Actually, his real idea was
to make his own sports cars, but they didn't have enough money yet. So Abarth didn't really
plan to be a tuning pioneer. This was just a means to a bigger goal, but that doesn't make it any less cool. This was 1949, more than
20 years before AMG, before M or any of those
guys came onto the scene. Why am I comparing Abarth to these in-house manufacturing tuners? A little thing I like
to call foreshadowing. (in echoing voice) Foreshadowing. Things are gonna get crazy
for Abarth real quick. But first, if Abarth & C
was gonna make cars bad-ass, they needed a bad-ass logo. It's like the most important
thing for a company. You think we'd be here without this? So Carlo turned to the most badass thing that he could think
of, astrology. (laughs) I guess he was at a loss for ideas because he was like, "What's my sign/ "I'll make that into the logo, done." Now, thankfully, he was a Scorpio, which is repped by scorpion, which is like the coolest
one on the Zodiac calendar. If he were a cancer,
we've have had a crab. (host coughs heavily and clears throat) With a sick logo nailed
down, a factory ready to go, and a rich co-owner ready
to drop G's on development, all Abarth needed was something to sell. Now, Carlo knew from his racing days that modifying exhausts was an easy way to make motorcycles go
faster and sound cooler. Why not apply this to street cars? So that's exactly what he did. He also copped the trick
from the Cisitalia playbook to make them look cool. A matte black finish
with flashy chrome tips, Abarth exhaust didn't just sound amazing. They were like jewelry for your cars, but (bell dings) the people of Italy
absolutely ate this up, like so much gabagool, and by the end of 1950, Abarth had sold nearly
5,000 custom exhausts. Now let me say that year again, 1950. Abarth & C was founded in 1949. All of this happened in one year. What could Carlo and his team
establish in another year? All those muffler profits got
Carlo the cash that he needed to develop more complicated
and expensive tuner parts, but more importantly, to him at the time, it meant he finally had the scratch to build a sports car of his own. Buying Cisitalia gave him a headstart 'cause the deal included
a half-built race car called the 204A. Abarth finished the car. Then he raced it all over Europe with his business partner,
Guido, behind the wheel. Guido wasn't just the
scratch behind Abarth, he tore crap up in the 204A, and Abarth used the prize money from winning all those races to build the company's
first street car, the 205A. All right, before I say
anything else about this car, I want you to look at it.
(wind chime music) Okay, it's beautiful because Abarth hired a dude from legendary Italian design
house, Bertone, to draw it up. This thing was quick too. Carlo and C doubled the horsepower on the 1.1 liter Fiat engine. The 205A was sleek, speedy, sexy, and very, very expensive to produce. Abarth only sold three 205As.
(cash register dings) This obviously wasn't gonna work. (metal clanks) So building your own car
is expensive, we got that. And developing performance
parts took time. Good to know. With that valuable information
at hand, Carlo refocused. Maybe there was a way to work with an established car company to make these bad-ass road
cars that I wanna make. Maybe, but he needed to find one, one with lots of money. Wasn't already building
sick little street racers. Company like Fiat. Only problem, Fiat was based in Turin, and Abarth was more than
200 miles away in Bologna. Solution: move Abarth to Turin. This was a big, expensive business move, but it proved to be genius. Fiat was aware that
thousands of their customers were fitting Abarth
exhausts to their cars, and hey, wouldn't you know it? Now Abarth is just down the street. Carlo's just like, "Oh, hey man, "I'm new in town. "Just wanted to introduce myself, "and oh wait a minute, you build cars?" Fiat saw, "We're the largest
automobile manufacturer "in Italy." "There's no way you
are unfamiliar with us. "Our cars are a legion." "What? "What a coincidence 'cause
I can make cars faster." "What?"
(car engine humming) "I can make cars faster." "What?" "Sorry, my bad. "I made the exhaust in those cars. "I said, I can make cars faster." Fiat and Abarth struck up a
working relationship in 1952. Abarth would undertake special projects for Fiat and in return, Fiat would foot the bill and
retain rights to the cars. In the industry, that's
what we call a win-win. After a few rollercoaster
years of big swings and even bigger whiffs, Carlo finally felt safe. And as you psych majors know, you gotta feel safe before you can work to your full potential. And oh man, Carlo felt very safe. Just look at the first
joint Fiat-Abarth project. This is the Fiat Abarth 1500 Biposto. Now look at this thing compared to the car that it was based on, the Fiat 1400. That's what most cars
looked like back then. Now credit for this
spaceship goes to Bertone. Bertone made this car
beautiful, but Abarth, he made it fast. He took the stock 1.5 liter Fiat engine, worked his scorpion magic, and rung an astonishing 68% more power out of it without using a
turbo or a supercharger. It was a cosmic leap in power to match the car's cosmic looks. Carlo and C were getting
really, really, really, really friggin' good at this. The 1500 Biposto was displayed at the 1952 Turin Auto Show, and people went absolutely ape. This car put Fiat Abarth on the map. They became the talk of the frickin' town. They were like the first power couple. The Italian super dup built a few more over-the-top prototypes like
this one in their early years, but that's not really
what Abarth is known for. So we're gonna fast forward a few years to the introduction of the Fiat 600, not the 500, that's gonna come later. The 600 is the 500's older brother. It was a little rear engine city car, kinda like a cross between
a Volkswagen Beetle and a Mini Cooper,
(thunder crashes) but without any of the
reliability or performance that made those cars good, just
the cheeky design language. But once the scorpion stunning the 600, it was nothing to fool around with. Abarth modified the 600 with bigger carbs, juiced up internals, and of course, brappy exhaust systems to create a whole line of tuned 600s. Most of them used the stock
body modeled with fender flairs for wider wheels and a
beefy front air dram. But every now and then,
they do one up real special. For example, take a look at
the Fiat Abarth 750 Zagato. If you've been watching this
show since the beginning, you know Zagato. It's another legendary
Italian design house, just like Bertone. They designed the prettiest
Aston Martin ever made, the DB4 GTZ. The Fiat Abarth 750 Zagato
isn't as pretty as those cars, but you gotta remember
what they started with. And as you can see, Carlo
was living his best life. (sexy music) He was doing what he loved with the financial backing of Fiat and Fiat loved it too. People were buying
Abarth 600s, racing 'em, crashing 'em, coming back
and buying more of 'em. Cha-ching much? Just when Carlo thought things
couldn't get any better, his bosses at Fiat asked him
to drum up some publicity by going out and beating
some world records. And he did it in this: the
Fiat Abarth 750 Record. Frickin' so confident that
he named the car Record. Basically, it was a lightweight, streamlined version of
the Fiat Abarth 600. Lightweight as in like 850 pounds. So it only needed 47 horsepower to shatter a 24-hour endurance
record on it's first try. And this was just the first of 133 records that Abarth would set. Now breaking records is cool, but again, it's not really
what Abarth is known for. So let's get back to that then. Let's talk about the original Fiat 500. (upbeat rock music) All right, just like the modern 500, the original was cute and
slow, like, 13 horsepower slow. Carlo had his work cut out for him, but remember, he just
smashed three world records with only 47 horsepower to play with. He was confident that he'd
work his magic with the 500. And that's good because
Fiat was in big trouble. Now the OG 500 is an icon now, but when it launched in 1957, nobody was buying 'em 'cause
the car journalists of the time said it was unreliable and slow, and they weren't wrong. Fiat had screwed the pooch on this drop. So they turned to their
golden scorpion boy for help. And what Carlo came up with was the original Fiat Abarth 500. Made it look cooler,
made it handle better. He frickin' doubled the horsepower to 26. Double the power means double the speed. Double the pleasure, double the fun. An icon was born. The Abarth 500 was a success
right outta the gate. It broke six international
records in 1960 alone. By 1965, this hot little potato had nearly 900 race wins to its name. Carlo and his crew turned
a flop into a flyer. Abarth didn't just save the 500. They made it the pride of Italy. They made it a pop culture icon, and Abarth became so well known as a purveyor of things
powerful and Italian that they started using the name of Abarth as a freakin' word to
describe anything strong. Customers in cafes didn't
ask for strong coffee. They asked for Abarth coffee. The 1960s were incredible for Abarth & C. They built some of their
greatest cars to date and their aftermarket
tuning business expanded across the globe. But Carlo was getting old. And 1971, he sold his
dream company to Fiat, trusting them to carry
the banner of the scorpion into the fray of
competition in the future. Carlo Abarth passed away in 1979. He was 71 years old. He raced a train and he beat it. He bought a bankrupt company. He built one of the most
successful performance houses in history. He took economy cars and
built world record holders, race winners, and rally champions. He is an internal bad-ass, and to honor the eternal bad-ass, Fiat put all the Abarth &
C designers and engineers in charge of the Fiat racing
division, like fully in charge. They were given free rein to
work on Fiat's racing cars. And at this time in the 70s, Fiat was focused on rally racing, and they were campaigning
a hard top version of their little roadster, the 124 Spider. Once the scorpion got hold of that Spider, the rallying world learned
to fear bugs big time. The 124 won the European
Rally Championship in 1972 and again in 1975. Now that was cool, but Abarth figured that
they could do better. The next car is really
freaking cool, you guys, but don't take my word for it. Tyler, the creator, owns one, and he's just about one of
the coolest people on planet Fun fact, I used to write for him, so... I mean, one look at this thing, and you'll see why he
reps the scorpion, boom. Box flares, baby. The stock Fiat 131 is pretty uninspiring, clean, very generic. And if performance was
as boring as its looks, but in the hands of Abarth, the little rear wheel drive
131 became a rally legend that gave it a sick flared out,
lightweight fiberglass body and a rippin' two-liter
245 horsepower engine. And it won the World Rally Championship in 1977, 1978, and 1980, a three-peat. They just weren't feeling it in '79. They had an off year. Now naturally, race fans
wanted their own version of this hot little
scorpion for the street. And they were like, okay, because Fiat had to build some road cars to satisfy competition rules. So 400 131 Rallies hit
European dealerships in 1974. Now, after all that success, weirdly, Abarth just sort of ceased to be. Fiat was a huge company, and in the '70s, they were getting even bigger, swallowing up brands left and right like Nolan at a banana farm. (electronic music) One of those bananas that
they swallowed up was Lancia, another Italian car company
with iconic racing heritage. And for some reason, Fiat put all their racing
energy towards Lancia. No, I can't really complain about that because Lancia in the '80s made some of the most incredible
rally cars of all time. The Delta Integrale is
probably my favorite car. Tyler, the creator, owns one of them too. But Fiat's decision to focus on Lancia basically shut the door on Abarth. And in 1981, Abarth & C was no more. Fiat continued to use the name to market slightly hot rotted
versions of their cars, but this badge engineering
fell flat to true Abarth fans. The banner of the scorpion,
for the most part, remained folded up in a closet. That's where scorpions live. Until the newly merged Fiat Chrysler Group decided to re-introduce Fiat to America after a two decade hiatus. Now these guys, they're not dumb. They knew getting Americans to buy small European
hatchbacks was tough, and they knew selling the
retro Fiat 500 hatchback in America would be an uphill battle despite all the attention
its design was getting. Now it didn't take much of
a marketing study to see that Americans loved Volkswagen's GTI. Fiat Chrysler quickly realized that they needed a GTI
version of the new 500. And what's up? Guys, I was just looking in the closet. I found this really sick scorpion banner. 2007 Fiat Chrysler Group relaunched Abarth as the performance arm of Fiat, just like in the good old days. And with it came a new, high
performance Fiat 500 Abarth and a new Fiat 124 Spider Abarth. These cars are almost universally
considered fun as heck. They have a big dedicated fan base, and anyone who spends
any time behind the wheel of an Abarth knows why. They look very silly to me,
(car whooshes by) but they sound good.
(car hums loudly) With the Abarth 595, 695, and even the Abarth 1241 make European Rally Championship series, Fiat are honoring Carlo
and the Abarth brand exactly how they should by making cars faster, louder, (car engine revving)
and more fun. (upbeat music) (sighs) Looks pretty good. (man spits) - Donut has posters?
- Yeah, Donut has posters. - Donut has posters?
(man spits out drink) - Yeah, Donut has posters. - Donut has posters> - Yup, Donut has posters. - Wow!
- Wow! - Wow!
- Wow, (laughs) posters. Hang 'em in your bedroom, your office, or have 'em professionally
framed for your garage. Get your Donut posters just
today at donutmedia.com. - Wow!
- Wow! - Wow
- Wow, (laughs) posters. (TV beeps) Thank you guys so much
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