Go on, admit it: you watched One For The Road, the final episode of The Grand Tour (as we know it), and fell for Jeremy Clarkson’s wheels of choice – the Lancia Monte-Carlo.

Seeing the Monte-Carlo (the hyphen was Lancia’s style) romp across Zimbabwe was a reminder of what a perfectly proportioned thing it is. Like an espresso cup or Arco lamp, the mid-engined two seat sports car is elegantly simple, devoid of superfluous flim-flam and – judged on the drive enjoyed by Clarkson – perfectly fulfils its function.

Clarkson bought the car featured on that final episode and had it restored to keep. With such a ringing endorsement, is now the right time to own a Monte-Carlo – especially as making Lancia great again isn't likely to happen anytime soon?

Let’s remind ourselves of what the Monte-Carlo is and look at how it’s performing in the market, with data-informed views from Giles Gunning, founder of The Classic Valuer.

Potted history: Lancia Monte-Carlo

First things first, there were two incarnations of the Monte-Carlo, mainly because the first version tried to kill drivers.

Originally called Beta Monte-Carlo, the sleek Italian two-seater was launched in 1975, as a coupe or spider, and was designed and largely built by design house, Pininfarina – the same outfit so admired by Enzo Ferrari.

Initially, it was supposed to be a Fiat, but Lancia adopted it, making it part of its storied lineup at a time when Lancia was one of the coolest car makers on the road, with hits including the Fulvia and Stratos.

The Monte-Carlo had a fizzy, Aurelio Lampredi-designed 118bhp 2-litre twin-cam ‘four’ and five-speed gearbox, independent suspension and disc brakes. All seemingly the perfect ingredients for a fun runaround. The trouble was, the servo for the brakes was too powerful and the front wheels would lock up if you so much as sneezed on the middle pedal.

So Lancia took the car off sale for two years, returning it to the road as simply the Monte-Carlo, in 1980. By the time the shutters came down on the production line, in 1982, a total of 7578 had been built.

What was the Monte-Carlo’s world rally connection?

If you’re a fan of rallying, you’ll be a fan of the short-lived Group B era. The Lancia Monte-Carlo provided the base for the legendary 037 – Markku Alén, Finland’s Mr “Maximum Attack”, rated it as his favourite rally car.

It also underpinned the turbocharged Group 5 endurance racer, the forgotten Beta Monte-Carlo Turbo (which I profiled for Motor Sport magazine, here), which was actually one of Lancia’s greatest successes in motor racing, boasting two overall World Sportscar Championships under the watch of Cesare Fiorio, Lancia’s legendary mastermind of motor sport.

What’s a Lancia Monte-Carlo like to drive?

This was and remains a feel-good car. However, be warned, some fine-tuning of any Monte-Carlo’s carb may be required from time to time. Testing the original Beta Monte-Carlo, in 1977, Motor Sport magazine wrote: ‘it takes a long, long time to warm up and remains full of flat-spots for several miles. The test car had a permanent hole in the carburation, in fact, and a pronounced flat-spot step on progression to the Weber’s second choke.’ Hopefully attentive owners will have rectified this over the years.

Motor Sport praised the performance as ‘highly acceptable on the road and surprisingly good against the stop-watch for a 2-litre car’ and liked the way it could be coaxed out of understeer with a lift of the throttle which resulted in progressive oversteer.

They were less enamoured with its behaviour on wet roads, simply because of the front brakes that locked up with unnerving ease – a fault that Lancia would ultimately address.

Autocar roadtest results, June 1981

Power 120bhp at 6000rpm Torque 126lb ft at 3400rpm 0-60mph 8.6sec 0-100mph 29.7sec 
‍Standing quarter mile 16.4sec at 82mph Top speed 120mph Economy 25mpg

Tracking the values of the Lancia Monte-Carlo

The Monte-Carlo is a rare find on UK roads now, writes Giles Gunning of The Classic Valuer. According to DVLA data, only 100 remain licensed in the UK, with 113 cars declared SORN. Read into that what you will.

Values wise, prices have been steady for the Monte-Carlo over the past few years so expect to pay in the region of £10,000 to £17,000, depending on condition and history, with spiders generally attracting a premium over their coupe cousins.

It’s been over a year since we’ve seen a Monte-Carlo come to auction, so despite The Grand Tour appearance values haven’t ballooned yet. A RHD Monte-Carlo Spider with 43,600 miles is available today with an asking price of £15,000 in the UK. A late, 1983 39,000-mile Spider sold for £18,975 through Manor Park Classics, last February.  

Despite his one-man campaign to make Lancia great again, it's unlikely that Jeremy Clarkson’s publicly displayed fondness for the Montecarlo will undo the widespread apathy felt by Britain’s drivers towards Lancias and the Montecarlo in particular.

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