Our Cars: Dan’s A110

I can’t see them but I know the suspension arms are a blur, strobing like the wings of a hummingbird. On a bumpy road, very light springs and lots of travel mean the wheels rise and fall effortlessly over the shape of the asphalt. The body rolls in corners and gently bobs up and down as the road kicks up or drops away. I feel like I’m driving a Fifties cigar tube Grand Prix racer, suspended between the four wheels, inches above the ground.

That’s the sensation I love most in my Alpine. That flexible, malleable chassis, the body jinking lightly this way and that. Too many modern performance cars feel stiff and inert, thudding along the road all heavy, rigid and lumpen. It’s the difference between a stone cold squash ball that hits a wall and dies, and one that’s been whacked around the court for half an hour so it pings about the place.