Ask pretty much any car enthusiast about Lancia and you’ll get at the very least a happy smile, as their brain rifles through memory filing cabinets with labels such as Aurelia, Fulvia and Stratos. When the file marked “Delta” gets opened, that smile will likely become ever wider, as the memories start to encompass such motorsport legends as Didier Auriol, Carlos Sainz and Miki Biasion, all with a side helping of gorgeous red-and-blue Martini stripes.

Delving deeper into that memory cabinet is not really worth it. Lancia climbed an absolute peak of both performance and image with those Delta Integrale rally cars (and their beautifully balanced road-going equivalents) in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but the brand’s history since has been rather more tragic.