Back in the old days, owning a high-performance car meant, among other things, limited drivability. The Shah of Persia is a particular exception to the rule, ordering his Miura with studded tires to handle the snow-covered roads in the Alps. These days, on the other hand, automakers do their best to fine-tune the chassis and electronics for the vehicle to cope with the most detrimental of weather conditions.
Aston Martin is one of those brands, showcasing the all-new Vantage doing its thing at -28° Celsius in Ivalo, Finland. Equipped with winter tires, the two-seat sports car with Mercedes-AMG V8 power laughs in the face of snow and sub-zero temperatures, but it can also do the slipping-and-sliding stuff if you ask it nicely.
Presented in November 2017, the newcomer prepares to hit dealer showrooms. First deliveries are scheduled for the second quarter of 2018, with pricing kicking off at $149,995 in the United States of America. For reference, the old-gen Vantage with the 4.7-liter V8 and S suffix used to retail at $134,295, packing 436 horsepower.
The replacement ups the ante to 510 metric ponies despite a drop in displacement, all thanks to the twin-turbocharged setup coming from Mercedes-AMG. Torque is also up to 685 Nm (505 pound-feet) from 2,000 to 5,000 rpm, giving the Vantage a different character from the 490 Nm (361 pound-feet) at 5,000 rpm of its predecessor.
Supervised by chief engineer Matt Becker, the cold-weather testing in Finland will come to an end after 20,000 kilometers (almost 12,400 miles). The camouflaged Vantage in the video is a validation prototype, which differs from the production Vantage through the software of the steering system. The purpose of this testing session is, of course, the fine-tuning of the car’s handling in this sort of weather.
Given time, the baby Aston will be offered with a manual transmission (!!!), the twin-turbo V12 from the DB11, and there’s a case to be made for Mercedes-Benz’s M256 inline-six from the CLS 53. Oh, and look forward to the Vantage Roadster in the lattermost part of 2018 or early 2019.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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