ALL THE WORLD'S A STAGE

 An Integrale can make any road feel like a rally stage. Alex Wolstenholme reports

Sometimes, greatness can’t be rushed. Lancia’s humble Delta family hatchback had been around since 1979, but it wasn’t until 1987 that the now-famous Integrale badge was applied to the road car. And for the next seven years, it signified the pinnacle of the hot hatch, with supercar-embarrassing performance on the road and world beating pace on the rally stage.

The Delta had already shown it self to be a competent performer, with HF variants in 1983 and the turbocharged HF 4WD in 1986. When Lancia decided to take the Delta rallying in the new 1987 Group A class, the wick was turned up once

again for the road-going models. As per the rules, 5000 homologated road cars had to be built each year to comply with regulations, but by 1993 demand had pushed Integrale production to nearly 45,000.

HF High Fidelity) lettering and its galloping elephant mascot had signified fast Lancias for almost 25 years and, in the words of Gianni Lancia, that was because once an elephant starts running, nobody can stop it”. And the Integrale only took this further: in 1987, 1988 and 1989, it wrapped up the drivers’ World Rally Championship in dominant style, and even in 1991, it beat the mighty and modern Celica GT-Four to a surprise fourth championship.