Alfa Romeo’s full on assault on the North American car market has been pushed back until 2011 due to the current financial crisis, however the first trickle of Alfa cars went on sale in the United States last month and late last week the first of these was delivered to its expectant owner. Taking delivery of the first new Alfa Romeo since the mid-1990s was famous Ferrari owner James Glickenhaus, who most readers would recognize as the owner of the Pininfarina-designed Ferrari P4/5 custom Enzo supercar.

Alfa Romeo launched the car at a ceremony at Miller Motorcars in Greenwich, Connecticut, last week. The company had three examples of the stunning supercar on show, and only a total of 80 examples are planned for U.S. sale.

Speaking with VeloceToday, Alfa Romeo project manager Renzo Barbirato said Glickenhaus ordered his car in the same specially formulated color as his unique Ferrari P4/5. The remaining two cars went to two different vintage car collectors.

Only 500 examples of the 8C will be built for worldwide consumption but an additional 500 ‘Spider’ convertibles will also be built as well as 100 high-performance ‘GTA’ editions. The standard 8C Competizione, meanwhile, features a 4.7L V8 engine churning out 450hp (335kW) though a six-speed electronically controlled manual gearbox.