An SUV With Sporting Flare

Driving Alfa Romeo’s Stelvio Quadrifoglio up the UAE’s highest mountain

- Roger Field

Alfa Romeo made a bold statement with the launch of the Stelvio Quadrifoglio, a muscular 510hp 2.9 litre V6 Bi-Turbo SUV cross-over, late last year. It felt as though Alfa Romeo’s owner, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, had quietly rolled its tanks onto a stretch of premium SUV populated land hitherto owned by the likes of BMW and Porsche. Alfa pitched the Stelvio Quadrifoglio as the fastest SUV available (based on its speed around Germany’s Nurburgring race-track) and with a top speed of 283km/h and a 0-100km time of 3.8 seconds, it’s not difficult to see why the Stelvio pipped its closest rivals with a circuit time of 7 minutes 51.7 seconds (that’s about 8 seconds quicker than the Porsche Cayenne Turbo S managed around the same track).