05/03/2023
Gilberto Bagnasacco of Milano was a young man with a passion motorsport, on Tuesday 16th July 1962 he purchased a Lancia Flaminia Zagato Sport chassis # 824.13, body # 3354. Delivered in Milan, with licence plate number MI 668948 the car was painted in Amaranto Montebello (red) with black leather interior. It was a special-order build and left the Zagato factory with sliding Perspex windows mounted in lightweight aluminium door frames, Perspex rear ¼ windows and rear screen, no window lift mechanisms, no radio or heater, the interior was equipped with Zagato’s own competition racing seats. The bonnet & boot frame were drilled for more weight saving. A long-range fuel tank and spare wheel mounted the same as Lancia’s own Flaminia Zagato Speciale from 1961. The engine was modified and a roll bar fitted. The car’s unusual door handles were also seen on special builds by Zagato for Aston Martin, Alfa Romeo and Bristol. Gilberto entered # 3354 in its 1st outing at the Stallavena -Bosco hill climb event. He achieved a 1st in class GT cars - 1601 - 2500cc. Records show the car was a clear victor by 17 seconds over the next Flaminia. Next # 3354 was entered in the 1963 Targa Florio GT 2.5 lite class with brother Piero as co-driver. Unfortunately, the car was a DNS (did not start) and research has shown it was rolled and badly damaged in practice. # 3354 was repaired after the crash and in 1965 the car was put up for sale. On Thursday 5th August a young Italian who had immigrated to Australia was on holiday in Italy and wandered into a small garage with a few cars for sale in a back street in Milan. Sitting there was a small sports car with shiny red paint. He was told the Lancia Flaminia Zagato Sport was built to race between Milan and Rome, the price of 501,000 lira was agreed upon and # 3354 was his. On Saturday 14th August 1965, # 3354 left Italy bound for Australia. Used sparingly, the car remains in the family. After a poor restoration in 1980 it was decided to do it properly, in 2019 the car was sent to Re-creation Automotive in Melbourne Australia. Here it was stripped to a bare chassis and the painstaking job of restoring the car to it’s former race specifications was started. All of the original Zagato special features were still present. When the car was repaired in Italy it was fitted with a new roof and the series 1 front, it was decided to rebuild the body the way it looked when purchased. There is much more to the story and an article with documents and photograph will be published in a motoring magazine shortly. Many thanks to the original owner’s family in researching this amazing story.
