- One of approximately 60 202 SC Cabriolets built
- Eligible for a number of international motoring events, including the Mille Miglia
- Restored in its current ownership
Cisitalia’s first sports car, the 202, was based on the foundations of the company’s successful D46 single-seater race car—a car driven by some of the best drivers of the era, including Piero Taruffi, Clemente Biondetti, and Raymond Sommer. The 202 followed in its competitive footsteps and garnered lots of attention at the 1947 Mille Miglia. One of the company’s three works-entered cars was campaigned by Tazio Nuvolari, who put in a spectacular performance at the very front of the field.
Cruelty stuck, however, and Nuvolari’s lead was taken away due to ignition problems as a result of a torrential downpour. He achieved an impressive second place, followed by the two other Cisitalias. The Alfa Romeo 8C 2900B Berlinetta piloted by Emilio Romano and Clemente Biondetti may have taken the checkered flag that day, yet it was the trio of Cisitalias that followed—three radically modern sports cars from a new and comparatively little-known company—which captivated everyone’s attention.
The 202’s heart was an inline-four-cylinder pushrod engine displacing 1,090 cubic centimeters and producing 60 brake horsepower at 5,500 rpm. To clothe its spaceframe chassis, a variety of different Italian coachbuilders were employed, with two of the most popular being Vignale and Stabilimenti Farina. Although this car, chassis number 118 SC, bears the badges of Stabilimenti Farina and a registry compiled by the Cisitalia International Club in 1976 attributes its coachwork as such, more recent research leads us to believe that the coachwork could have been constructed by Vignale.
Interestingly, the example presented here was delivered new to Adalberto Fontana, an Italian who lived in Uruguay and was known for exporting Cisitalias to that South American country. Its next owner was Ricardo Augustyniak Caputi, who also resided in Uruguay. Under his ownership the car was painted red.
It later returned to Europe in the early 2000s where it was noted as being incomplete and fitted with a Nardi intake manifold modified for dual carburettors; this remains fitted to the car today. It came into the ownership Bernardo Favero in Italy thereafter and was repainted in white. Passing through Helmut Bende of Germany, the car was then brought to Austria, where it was owned by Thomas Matzelberger of Salzburg.
It was purchased by its current Austrian owner in 2011. After his acquisition, the car was brought to Germany, where it was restored to its current colour scheme of dark blue with a beige interior and fitted with Borrani wire wheels.
Combining coachbuilt bodywork with race-proven engineering, Cisitalias remain today as a highly celebrated postwar Italian marque, with perhaps its biggest endorsement being the decades-long ownership of a Cisitalia 202 Coupe by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Eligible for a number of concours and vintage rallies, including the Mille Miglia, Cisitalias are rarely available for purchase, and this example warrants serious consideration.
