The monster many knows, but cant recall
Niklas’ fingers were almost blue, and his hair followed the direction of the strong wind.
After a ride in Niklas’ Alfa Giulia, we’re now standing out in the middle of open fields to photograph his classic car. The only thing giving us a bit of shelter from the wind is a small, old red house. Both of us probably just want to get out of here, as the chilly autumn wind has truly taken hold of our bodies.
While we’re standing there, a Volvo V70 wagon pulls up and the driver’s window rolls down.
“Heard there was an Alfa out here tearing up the forest roads.”
Behind the wheel sits Claes Hoffsten, also known as the owner of Hoffsten Motor in Handen and for racing in the STCC during its golden years—when STCC aired on Swedish Television and almost became a national sport thanks to Rickard Rydell’s success in BTCC.
Claes raced from 2009 to 2011 with his prepped Alfa Romeo 156 and finished as high as 3rd place in the Semcon Cup—the private drivers’ cup—in 2010.
After introducing ourselves and chatting for a bit, Claes says he’s heading off—“If only I could figure out how this Volvo works,” he says with a smile.
Niklas later tells me that Claes is the guy to know in the Alfa community—there’s no one who knows Alfa and cars in general as well as Claes.
The next day, I get an email from Claes asking if I want to stop by Hoffsten Motor and check out the collection there. In the email, he had listed the cars he owned, and I couldn’t help but widen my eyes when I read it. Ferraris, Maseratis, a Lotus Omega, and 13 different Alfa Romeos of various kinds.
Unfortunately, we didn’t manage to meet up at the time, but Claes’ cheerful smile and his car list got stuck in my mind.
2 Years later
In Sweden, every car enthusiast is ready from March onward, waiting for the first warm sun to melt away all the snow and magically erase the stale cold and darkness of winter.
In April, everyone awaits the street sweepers to help push spring even further—cleaning the streets of all the gravel that kept us from slipping during the winter.
That’s also when the Swedish coffee ‘n’ cars season kicks off, and so it did in 2022.
The sun cuts through the cold morning air outside Stockholm’s Moderna Museet. Cars of all kinds are gathered here, and it feels good that the season has started again.
Row after row of cars line the area, until I suddenly find myself face to face with six square headlights in an aggressively forward-leaning front.
“Whooow,” I think out loud and quickly in my head.
I feel a genuine joy spread through my car-loving body as I see the boxy icon of a car in front of me.
Black and sparkling in the morning sun. Mean and forward-leaning. Short and raw with an Alfa Romeo emblem on the front.
This is the car everyone knows about but can never quite remember the name of:
“It’s that boxy model, right?”
“The one with six square headlights up front?”
“Yeah, the one that looks like its rear got chopped off?”
Everyone who’s into cars knows about it, knows the brand—but the model, that’s always hard to recall.
Let’s clear it up right away—Alfa Romeo SZ and Alfa Romeo RZ.
SZ stands for Sprint Zagato, it’s the one with a roof and was only made in red, except for ONE that was painted black for Andrea Zagato. RZ stands for Roadster Zagato, it’s the one without a roof and was made in red, yellow, and black.
The car was designed in-house at Alfa Romeo by Robert Opron.
Opron is also the father of other beautiful and standout cars—Citroën SM and GS, and Renault Fuego, to name a few. He was also involved in the facelifts of the Citroën DS and the Renault A310.
A total of about 1,000 units of the Alfa Romeo SZ were produced, while the sister model RZ was only produced in 278 units.
It’s said that none of the nearly 1,300 cars are identical, since all were handmade at Zagato’s factory between 1989 and 1992.
A keeper or not
As I’m standing there admiring it, I hear a cheerful voice behind me:
“This is a real keeper! I’ll never sell this. Never!”
I immediately recognize the voice and see Claes, smiling, chatting with someone who stopped by to admire his fascinating Alfa Romeo RZ.
“Or are you looking to buy?” he finishes the conversation, and both burst out laughing.
Claes and I manage to chat a bit about the car before he has to head off.
Claes has been selling car for almost 30 years
Claes was on his way to work north of Stockholm in his Dodge Stealth Turbo when the phone rang—almost 30 years ago now.
It was his father Ola, asking if he didn’t want to come along with him instead and start selling cars.
Just a few months earlier, Ola had bought Bilkällaren in Handen and doubled the turnover in car sales.
Said and done—Claes started selling cars soon afterward and quickly gained a solid reputation—the rest is history, and now it’s been over 30 years since they started working together.
Claes later took over the business himself but has now sold it to one of the employees, though he still steps in from time to time when some backup is needed.
The Hoffsten family has always been Alfa lovers and Alfa ambassadors, and Claes told me they were the only ones who had an Alfasud as a family car—summer and winter.
When I and Claes first got in contact, the list of cars was pretty long, but Claes has since let go of quite a few—or so he says—but as we go through his garage, he shows me an Alfa Super Saloon with an Indy-car engine in parts, a Lancia Delta ice racer, an Alfa GTV6 cruiser, a Pontiac Fiero Testarossa replica, an Alfa Sleeper, Alfa 1300 GT and the list goes on. He still has a great garage of Italian cars.
The feeling I get from Claes based on what I hear and see when I meet him is that he’s someone full of energy, kindness, projects, grit, speed, and fun ideas.
During the time we talk and meet, it feels like he himself is a story that should become a book soon.
Might be the next project 🙂
“Better you drive it”
A few weeks later, we decide to meet at the same place we met the first time, out in the field in Handen.
When I arrive, I see the square nose peeking out from behind the same red house. Claes steps out, greets me, and then presses the car key into my hand.
“Better that you take care of it yourself, so you get a feel for what it’s like to drive.”
Without protest, I take the key and Claes takes my car and drives off to Hoffsten Motor, where we’ll meet up later.
I barely have time to see the taillights of my BMW disappear behind the first bend before the first passing car drives by, honks, and gives a thumbs-up. I smile and return the gesture.
The top is down, and the sun makes the tiny flakes in the paint sparkle.
Originally, this model was called the ES30, which stood for Experimental Sportscar 3.0 liter.
The entire car is fundamentally built on the Alfa 75 Milano platform with the same drivetrain. The heart under the hood is a 3-liter Busso V6 with 12 valves that produced about 210 horsepower and a transaxle setup where the clutch and gearbox are located at the rear, to create better balance.
Giuseppe Busso was the one who designed and developed Alfa’s classic 60-degree V6, which was produced from 1978 until 2005 and came in many different versions in between.
This engine, often considered one of the best-sounding V6s ever, is said to deliver a powerful and emotional sound that further enhances the driving joy of the Alfas it powered.
I press down the clutch, shift to neutral, turn the key—all six cylinders fire up and the engine starts instantly.
I step out to listen to the muted idle—it sounds really nice.
I sit back down and rev lightly, getting goosebumps from the engine’s direct response and the realization that I’m actually sitting alone in such an iconic car.
Alfa Romeo Zagato SZ – A monster getting born?
Within the Fiat Group, which acquired the Alfa Romeo brand in 1986, the car was nicknamed “Il Mostro”—the monster. This nickname reflects the car’s raw and uncompromising design and its, at the time, powerful performance.
Fiat saw the Zagato SZ as a signal to the world that Alfa Romeo was now back on the sports car market with a model that both looked back on its heritage and paved the way forward with new technology and design.
The car was meant to evoke thoughts of Alfa Romeo’s magical F1 car—the 159—which dominated the tracks during the 1950s.
In 1989, the Alfa Romeo SZ was launched after only 19 months of development, and Fiat truly succeeded in bringing the Alfa Romeo brand back into the spotlight.
The SZ was built until 1991, followed by the RZ, which was produced between 1992 and 1993.
Even though the design was in-house at Alfa Romeo, Zagato was responsible for several specific design elements that gave the car its unique character. They contributed to the aerodynamic layout, including the distinctive roofline of the SZ and the sharp lines that created an aggressive yet elegant expression. The signature grille at the front and the design of the rear also bore clear traces of Zagato’s classic design philosophy. Additionally, Zagato was involved in designing the interior, ensuring that material choices and layout reflected their craftsmanship and exclusivity.
OOOOOH-shit handle
The burgundy leather interior gives a flashback to the luxurious ‘90s, and I get a bit of a Miami Vice vibe as I slowly slide into the driver’s seat and adjust myself to sit comfortably. The interior is a bit worn around the edges but still sharp and completes the character of the car.
During my time borrowing the car, I come to the conclusion that there really couldn’t be any other interior color than burgundy for this black car. The whole setup is just perfect.
On a small plaque in the center console, it says N° 149 RZ—indicating that this is the 149th Roadster made.
Sitting there, it almost feels like I’ve put on a car suit—the RZ feels that compact and neat around me. The black leather steering wheel has almost no padding and sits rock-solid in my hand.
I rev the engine again and the orange tachometer jumps against the white background.
The sound of the revving engine tells me that this four-wheeled machine is just here to have fun—real fun.
I glance over at the passenger seat where there’s a nice, generously sized “OOOOH-shit” handle. It’s clearly bolted into the seat—because in this car, you can really get tossed around.
The frame makes the car heavy but perfectly planted on the road
I press down the clutch and feel first gear click smoothly into place—the engine revs, and the clutch bites very high up. The start is a bit jerky, but after a few meters, the car is rolling comfortably.
I shift into second and feel it wants so much more—but I hold back.
Up front are a pair of 205-wide tires, while 245s in the rear keep the car planted to the road.
The road through the woods and fields goes up and down, right and left, with occasional short straights.
After a few hundred meters, I start to feel a bit comfortable with the car, shifting between second and third, and on a straight, I put it into fourth.
What strikes me the most is how stiff the entire car is. Every bump or dip is felt through the steering wheel and the body. The car jolts like a boat hitting a big wave, only to keep going exactly where you want it to.
All of this is due to the body being made of molded fiber-reinforced plastic panels bolted onto the frame. Despite the use of plastic to reduce weight, the car is heavier than expected because the experimental plastic panels weren’t made of lightweight fiberglass, but with a new method using molded fiber-reinforced plastic called “Modar,” which was generously thick.
When I later lift the hood, I understand how stiff the car is. The tiny hood requires me to use my whole core to get it up onto the support rod.
The frame is solid, while the steering is direct, and every turn becomes more and more fun to take the more I gain the car’s trust.
The Amiga car
One of the first times I came across an Alfa Romeo SZ was when I played SuperCars II on my friend’s Amiga 500 in the early ‘90s.
With really clunky and pixelated graphics, the game featured a Cizeta-Moroder V16T, a Honda NSX, and an Alfa Romeo SZ. They had different names, and the Alfa was called Taraco, but it was obvious which cars they were meant to represent.
Back then, there was absolutely no recognition of driving characteristics on screen—it was more about just surviving, making it around the track (seen from above), shooting your opponents with rockets, and planting mines along the course.
But the pixelated images of those luxury cars burned into my memory, and here I sit now, in the forest with the top down, driving an RZ on winding roads that zigzag between shadow and sun, trees and fields.
Performance of the past – not that impressive by today’s standards
I hit a straight stretch and press down. The engine listens to what I want to do and responds immediately—not exactly a fierce Italian kick from the 210 horsepower in the engine. It feels calm and comfortable, yet sharp and racy at the same time.
But it’s not on the straights where this car comes into its own—it’s in and out of the corners. Now I understand why the OOOOH-shit handle is so firmly bolted to the passenger seat.
The car follows every steering input to the millimeter and the suspension is stiff. In a right-hand curve, a seam in the asphalt causes the car to shift sideways a few centimeters, but it’s immediately back on track toward the destination as soon as the wheels hit the ground again.
Weight distribution in the car feels near perfect, from my amateur perspective.
The RZ’s suspension differs slightly from the Alfa Romeo 75 Milano in that the driver can adjust the height of the car by a few centimeters. Essentially, there are just two settings—high or low—controlled by two buttons in the center console, intended to help clear obstacles more easily.
Time flies
After nearly two hours in the forest, I return to Hoffsten Motor and take a deep breath of joy and satisfaction. I feel my lips are shaped like a big banana across my face.
I step out to take one last walk around the car and realize I haven’t checked the trunk yet.
I curiously open the rear hatch, which drops toward you rather than opening upward, only to be met by a spare tire.
Aside from the spare, you might be able to squeeze in a few polishing cloths and a coffee thermos—but that’s it.
I step back and take one last look at the car, which measures only 406 cm in length.
The dark integrated light strip in the rear radiates the future, the 10 round holes in each rim radiate racing, and the car’s forward-leaning stance radiates speed.
Alfa really succeeded in delivering an icon to the car world when they created this beautiful monster.
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