#SupercarSunday -Maserati Boomerang

The Maserati Boomerang is undoubtedly one of the most important concept cars of the 20th century, it’s revolutionary wedge shape would go on to influence automobile designers for decades to come, and it would become the de facto shape for almost all supercars from the decade of its introduction onwards.
Designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro, the Boomerang was introduced as a non-running concept car at the 1971 Turin Auto Show. By the time it was shown at the Geneva Motor Show a year later it had been updated with a fully-functioning drive train borrowed from a Maserati Bora, this included the 4.7 litre V8 capable of 310 bhp and a top speed of well over 300 kph. It was then, until 1974, successively shown at the Paris, London and Barcelona motor shows and was unanimously praised for its audacity.

Unlike now, it was not uncommon for manufacturers and coachbuilders to sell their concept cars when they had served their purpose. After the Barcelona show, the Boomerang remained in Spain and was eventually sold to a cabaret owner in Benidorm. The former owner a noted Maserati enthusiast discovered it there during a holiday trip in 1980 and could not resist the temptation of buying it as he had first seen the car eight years earlier and had only able to purchase a model of it. After a careful restoration, it re-appeared for the first time in the 1990 Bagatelle Concours in Paris, where Giorgetto Giugiaro was a judge and proudly hand-signed the rear panel.

The Boomerang is powered by a race-bred 310 bhp 4.7L V8 engine driving the rear wheels. Said engine is borrowed from the Bora and is linked to 5 speed manual transmission. Its drivetrain may be impressive, but the unique dashboard layout is what really caught the publics attention. Normally, cars have the gauge cluster above the wheel, in your line of sight- not the Boomerang. The steering wheel and gauge cluster are part of a single console that emerges from the dash, and the steering wheel rotates around the stationary gauges. Revolutionary then, still is now. Elsewhere in the interior, the brown leather seats sit low, following the curve of your back. The centre console houses all the normal stuff, but flows and fits perfectly with its surroundings.

According to Giorgetto Giugiaro, the design had been “in mind for at least two years” – but it’s likely that the first ideas would have sprouted in the designer’s head as early as 1968, and more specifically the première of the Bertone-styled Alfa Romeo Carabo. It was that car which presaged all the angular activities of the seventies. Giugiaro may have been pipped to the wedge-shaped post, but he wasn’t to be outdone. He brought together his favourite design flourishes from some of his then-recent concepts (which included Alfa Romeos Caimano and Iguana, as well as the VW/Porsche Tapiro) and melded them into an explosion of creativity. The resulting Boomerang was, according to Giugiaro, “drawn almost exclusively with a ruler” – a practice of which the ever-modest automotive sage has spoken unfavourably in recent times.

Ultimately, the idea behind the radical Boomerang concept might have been before its time, but it served not only as a precursor to later Giugiaro cars, but also as an advert for his design brilliance. In fact, it was apparently the Boomerang which convinced VW to appoint Giugiaro to design the original Golf – and we all know how that played out.