Next weekend sees the 52nd running of what has now become the Australian Fiat Nationals. This year, it is being held at Benalla, Victoria with the competition at the track at Winton (5km away) This is about 25km from Glenrowan where one of Australia's most infamous bushrangers, Ned Kelly, was captured.

I'm leaving Brisbane early on Thursday morning, sharing the 1500km drive south in an Abarth 500 Essesse, in company with a small group of fellow enthusiasts. We plan to do 1000km the first day with an overnight stop at Forbes. Another early start, will allow the competitors to get in some practice laps at Winton on Friday afternoon.

I expect to see Wazza from Sydney and Scuderia from Melbourne in attendance (hopefully with their Coupes) and at least another few Coupes as well.

DanDan is now working in northern Victoria (about 100km from Benalla), so we also hope to see him attending. It would be good if he does, as he would be the furtherest distance travelled (from the UK) otherwise that will go to the New Zealand contingent that is also attending.

The following weekend will see AutoItalia on the lawns of old Parliament House in Canberra. Several of our Queensland members are delaying their drive home to also attend this and display their cars.

What with the F1 GP this weekend in Melbourne, Fiat Nationals next weekend and then AutoItalia the following weekend, it is all happening in southern Australia!!!

that will keep you busy! Hope you can share some photos later

Possum,

You want ME to bring my Coupe to the Nationals when YOU aren't????

We are towing our race X1/9 prototipo down plus the rail, so can't get the Coupe there too. Maybe we need to buy a large truck to transport all of our toys?

By the way, can you send me an email so that I have your current email address. I don't think the one I have works anymore?

Well I will be there with my Coupe, and it looks like I'll have the only one at this stage. See you all there.

A great event.
Brett driving my Coupe

The only coupe on the day, fastest in class, beat all the Abarth 500s and 695s.

Great effort - well done. Love the vid too - not used to seeing such blue sky when watching track day action!
Car sounds fab too! Keeping the Coupe alive in Aus. No rust worries.
What's parts availability's like?

New parts are no problem, when ordered from the the UK or NZ they typically arrive within a week or so. I can also order any part through one of the new Fiat dealers if I have the part number.

As it turns out the 695 piped me at the post. He pulled in a lap 0.1s faster than me over the 1m50s lap. I was 3-4 seconds faster than him at the beginning of the day and I didn't expect he would improve so much. It was good fun anyway. I can't believe we polished off almost 2 full tanks of fuel on the day! I've never come close to that before.

When will you have a rematch? 0.1s, what a bummer!

There is always next year

And that will be in Queensland, so you can have the long drive. As mentioned above, I shared the drive down in an Abarth and yesterday, we did the 1500km trip home in 17 1/2 hours. Hope we don't get any surprises in the mail! And we did not have to dodge any emus, like we did on the drive south.

It certainly was a great weekend, especially catching up with fellow Coupe owners from Australia and New Zealand. Even managed to organise a 16v wheel to come over with a
mate's parts order from NZ.

Looked like fun!

Fiat Coupe Owners of Australia and New Zealand at the 2015 Fiat Nationals, Victoria.

Scuderia,

i was just about to post that photo here, but you beat me to it! I assume you got it from Possum as I sent it to him 2 days ago?

Anyway, for those interested, the Coupe owners are from Australia and New Zealand and their Coupe Forum handles are:-

(L to r) _____ (NZ), Wazza (Aus), Possum (Aus), _____ (NZ), Scuderia (Aus), ______ (NZ) and Ian (Aus but a non Forum bloke)

Can our NZers please add their user names in other posts?

I'm going to take my Coupe to Canberra next Sunday for the biggest Italian Car show in Australia, Auto Italia, held annually.

Cheers all

OK filling in the missing forum names from L to R

evlone(NZ), alinesnz (NZ), th130 (NZ)

OK filling in the missing names from L to R

evlone(NZ), alinesnz (NZ), th130 (NZ)

The car of the event was driven by a Coupe owner,

A 30 year old Fiat Regatta 100s with over half a million kilometers on the clock. It survived the whole weekend of punishment and kept on ticking.

Great stuff guys. Wazza, I look forward to seeing photos of the Auto Italian event - I used to live in Canberra and attended the event every year. Mind you, the last time I went was probably back in 2002!

Boosted7,

Camera is packed and Coupe is ready to go.

I have 29 photos that I took at the 2002 Auto Italia. Bet you're not in one though! :-)

I'd love to go to Auto Italia but the Cricket World Cup final (Australia vs New Zealand) is calling my name and it's a lot closer!

Earlier this afternoon, I had a phone call from a fellow Car Club member who attended Auto Italia in Canberra today. (He delayed his return from the Nationals to attend this event).

He really enjoyed the day and was impressed with both the quantity and quality of the vehicles exhibited.

Can't wait to see both his and Wazza's photos.

OK, you asked for them.... Pics from Auto Italia, Canberra 2015

(I'll do this in multiple posts as I tried this last night and after adding about 10 photos to a post my PC locked up again and I lost the lot)


My Coupe outside Old Parliament House, Canberra


The other Fiat Coupe from Sydney


My Coupe again


Mmmmm, nice 500s


Says it all, really...

More from AI 2015




Immaculate Fiat Dino Spider


1922 Fiat 501


1914 Fiat


Some nice X1/9s.... 9 of them in fact


Only 8 of them at this stage of the show


A Fiat Stilo Michael Schumaker next to a Fiat 2300 wagon

Still more of AI 2015


Probably the best Fiat 131 Racing in the world! (Yes, I know it's called the Sport in the UK)


Fiat 124 Spider automatic (his wife's car)


Now this is something rare! A Fiat 600 Multipla


And lastly, the Ferraris... They were expecting 20-30 but 60 turned up!

Hi grandad Wazza,
Thank you for sharing these lovely pictures.
Great effort for turning up in your coop as well.
Looks like a fantastic event.
A bit like the Abarth Works Museum you visited last year in Belgium, bit then an outdoors version of it .

Alesi,

The number, type and rarity of the Fiats at the Abarth Works Museum was far superior. But Auto Italia was pretty darn good anyway.

Hope you and your better half are well mate.

Any Given Reason Blog

Loving the Multipla!

Good job it has headlights! else i was struggling to work out the front from the back! but its just looks so cool!!

Looks like a fantastic day was had

The 600 Multipla lives at the Gold Coast and the owner is a Qantas pilot. This certainly helped when acquiring parts from overseas for the restoration. Interesting, in the original advertising material by Fiat, it was promoted as a "Multi Purpose Vehicle" decades before the Japanese used this phrase in their ads.

The 131R on display was the only one brought here by Fiat Australia and was brought in for a Sydney Motor Show. Until recently, it too lived at the Gold Coast.

Some great shots in that Photoroll