206GTI_MD • 2000 Peugeot 206 GTi

The Story

I fell in love with Peugeot starting with the Group B Peugeot 205 of rally racing legends. Rally always appealed to me as my favorite form of racing, probably largely due to having grown up near the Canadian border in Upstate NY and having a huge affinity for driving in snow/on loose surfaces. As I have gotten older, I also identify with a strong desire to *continue* getting older and unfortunately driving a Peugeot 205 on American roads is pretty much asking for it, so I began looking into the younger sibling which has at least passable safety features by modern standards. The 206 represents a perfect compromise between an excellent driving experience (nothing quite like a mechanically linked throttle and clutch, drive-by-wire is such a bummer IMO) and enough safety features to convince my family that importing one was a reasonable thing to do.

Luckily, I made a connection to a person in Italy whose entire job is to inspect cars for foreigners (think 400-500 high quality photos inside and out and a video to accompany them), broker the sale, and then arrange for any mechanical/cosmetic restoration before the car leaves the origin country. This helped me save enormously on parts/labor since everything could be easily sourced there, and it gave me the benefit of not having to buy sight-unseen. It still required surrendering a LOT of trust to total strangers that I wasn't going to get ripped off (a wire transfer to an anonymous foreign bank account, as an example), but ultimately after about 6 months the car was delivered straight to my door in immaculate condition.

Vehicle Info

Engine
NA 2.0L I4
Color
Tangerine
Location
Baltimore, MD
Transmission
Manual
Drivetrain
FWD
Horsepower
136 hp
Torque
140 lb-ft

Cosmetic Modifications

Custom Armrest Kit

Clubs

This vehicle is not in any clubs yet!