There was something that Miki Biasion, the driver who won back-to-back World Rally Championship titles with Lancia in 1988 and ’89, said at the launch of the brand’s new Ypsilon rally car that honestly gave me goosebumps. “If you dreamt of [the] track as a child, you dreamt of the red of a Ferrari,” Biasion’s quoted in the company’s press release. “However, if you dreamt of becoming a rally driver, then you dreamt of Lancia.”
The man’s not wrong, and though Lancia’s legacy in rallying from the ’60s through the early ’90s will be damn near impossible to top, the marque has finally taken the first step toward reclaiming that glory. The Ypsilon Rally4 HF is officially on sale to customer teams starting today, for the equivalent of $80,416 in euros.
Its bill of goods is modest: a turbocharged, 1.2-liter three-cylinder engine sending 212 horsepower to the front wheels through a five-speed gearbox and limited-slip differential. But the Rally4 class in which the Ypsilon is built to compete is a stepping stone for future stars, showcasing competition in vehicles that are much closer to production machines than the high-downforce, silhouette rally cars that define the WRC’s top category.
Lancia will field the Ypsilon in a factory European Rally Championship effort beginning in 2026. Before then, it’ll run in the Italian Rally Championship, where Lancia will hold a competition of its own over six of the upcoming season’s rallies. The winner will be rewarded with a seat on the ERC team the following year.
So no—this humble hatch is not vying for the Delta’s spot just yet, let alone those of the 037 or Stratos. But it’s a start, and as one of those kids who indeed dreamt of Lancias while others were more concerned with Ferraris, seeing one of the brand’s current models tearing up a tarmac stage can’t help but bring a smile to my face.
Some will argue that the Ypsilon is a glorified Peugeot 208—a known quantity in the rally scene—and point out that its spiciest production counterpart is fully electric and overweight, not unlike the Jeep it shares a platform with. I won’t disagree with any of that, but look: If you’ve been following Lancia for a while, you know things were really grim for a couple of decades there. The company was disconcertingly quick to shed its high-performance image to court high fashion and personal luxury, before being briefly and unconvincingly recast as Europe’s Chrysler, and then having its entire lineup whittled back down to a single car, an overpriced Fiat 500.
I’ll definitely take this timeline, where Miki Biasion is advising the development of Lancia’s road and race cars, over those. If the brand wants to reform its entire identity around things it achieved 30-plus years ago, I’m all for seeing how it intends to pay tribute to that history and maybe even write a few new pages in the book, too.
Carmine Arrichiello/Lancia
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