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First drive: Aston Martin V12 Vantage RS is 'best ever' |
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Written by Andrew Frankel
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Though few speak out in public, the motor industry is not short of those who say Aston Martin, for all its wonderful products and bulging order books, is going to find life hard now that it has returned to independent ownership some 17 years after the company was sold to Ford in an almost moribund condition.
TWO FINGERED SALUTE
Unsurprisingly, Aston Martin says otherwise. It points to its small size and independence as a good thing because now it can make its own choices and react much more swiftly than when all-important decisions had to be rubber-stamped by the ailing Detroit-based industrial leviathan.
Besides, a chunk of Aston Martin is still owned by Ford yet it remains free to form strategic alliances with whoever else it chooses to ensure its access to state of the art technology is retained.
However, it seems that a gesture was needed - a small but significant two-fingered salute to those who claim Aston Martin was only as good as the Blue Oval behind it. It would have to communicate a message like no other Aston Martin has in its 95-year history, an affirmation of how good is life as an independent and a statement of intent for the future. They decided to call it the Aston Martin V12 Vantage RS.
I've driven it and it is, without any doubt, the most extraordinary road car ever to display the Aston wings on its nose.
CERTIFIABLY INSANE
At its most basic, the V12 Vantage RS is exactly as described on the
tin - An Aston Vantage with the 4.3-litre V8 motor replaced by the
6-litre V12 used by the DB9 and DBS. And were it as simple as that, the
proposition would be enticing enough, but describing this car as a
Vantage with a V12 motor is like calling the Titanic a boat.
It is so much more than that. For a start, the engine is neither the
450bhp version used in the DB9 nor the one with 510bhp used by the DBS.
It is a full race engine with a whole host of expensive modifications
from forged pistons to dry sump lubrication that allows it to pump out
a mighty 600bhp.
That would be impressive enough and would confer startling performance upon the little Vantage even if the extra mass of the big engine did push its weight far beyond its current 1630kg.
But the V12 Vantage does not weigh much more than a V8 Vantage: if fact it weighs less, 130kg less in fact, thanks in part to the removal of non-essential items such as air-conditioning, airbags and a chunk of sound deadening. The main weight loss, however, is down to the replacement of aluminium body panels such as the bonnet, bootlid and door inners with flyweight items made from carbon fibre.
To help put this in perspective, imagine a car weighing the same as a basic spec, 1.8-litre diesel powered Ford Mondeo but with the same power as the Aston Martin DBR9 racing car that won the GT category at the Le Mans 24-hours last year. You might expect the result to be certifiably insane. And you'd be right.
Because the car you're looking at is the only V12 Vantage RS currently in existence and was designed as a concept car to sit on a show stand and not rocket up the public road, it is entirely road illegal and can, therefore, only be run on a test track.
However, unlike most concepts whose doors start to fall off if you drive them at much more than 30mph, this one was still yelling for more when I had to brake for the corner at the end of the back straight at, conservatively, 175mph. I'd estimate its 0-60mph time to be around 3.5sec with no more than the same again being required to get from 60-100mph. So that's 0-100mph in a nice, round 7sec which, as you will have noticed, is a perfectly respectable 0-60mph for most normal performance cars.
A HOWL OF FEROCITY
To accompany the V12 Vantage RS's epic straight-line speed comes a soundtrack straight from a Steve McQueen race car movie.
For those who have never heard a racing-specification V12 engine at full cry, all I can say is get yourself to Le Mans this summer for there is something missing from your life. For while the motor in a DB9 or DBS sounds wonderfully invigorating at full throttle, this one is nothing less than savage and the better for it. Even if you merely brush the accelerator while at a standstill, the engine barks its approval. Give the pedal a proper stab and it will emit a howl of such ferocity that it makes you want to duck.
And it's true that, at first, it is an entirely intimidating car. Very experienced drivers not known for being scared of anything much were seen giggling nervously before climbing aboard and trying their luck around Bernie Ecclestone's Paul Ricard private test track. For while the cabin looks little different to that of a normal Vantage, once underway, there are no further comparisons to make.
This is a car to make you sweat on a cold day. Its acceleration is not unmanageable but it lives in a place right on the outer edge of your comfort zone. Instead of looking eagerly at the instruments to see how fast you're travelling, you actively try quite hard not to think about it. You wonder if there is any point returning your hand to the wheel for that ever so brief pause in its insatiable appetite for gears, but you do anyway, just because guiding this thing with just one hand on the helm seems a long way from a good idea.
As you reach the end of the 1.8km straight it's clear that very little work has yet been done on the car's aerodynamics because the steering is worryingly light and the car starts to wander across the track. So you tread on the brake and the feel the pedal sink disconcertingly under your foot with little sign of any meaningful retardation. Then, suddenly, the temperature of the carbon ceramic discs hit their correct operating zone, the nose dips, stability returns and your excess speed is discarded in an instant.
Surprisingly, given its early stage of development and the weight of the huge engine in the nose, it's astonishingly good in the corners. It's running on road legal Pirelli track tyres and while their grip levels are not quite so good as pure racing slicks, they cling to the track massively better than any normal road rubber and give you at least a chance if it's raining which, thankfully, it was not. The steering feels reassuringly heavy and precise, guiding the nose of the car with unquestioned accuracy onto your chosen line and once in the corner, even when you're right on the limit, it feels neutral, progressive and, above all else, on your side.
Of course it could still land you in more trouble than you could conceive in less time than you could imagine, but it would only happen if you were treating the car with less than the respect it deserves. If you are not constantly aware, not simply of its power, but its short wheelbase and the fact that traction control is provided by your right foot alone, frankly you deserve what's coming. If you look after it, it will look after you. If you don't, say hello to a hedge.
PURE DRIVING PLEASURE
The significance of the V12 Vantage RS extends so much further than its role as an ultra-high performance supercar. It's also a new breed of product for Aston Martin.
Even if you gaze into the mists of times, you'll find that despite the very sporting image of the company, it has mainly busied itself with building fast touring cars - more cruisers than bruisers. The normal Vantage is pleasingly sporting but still very much an everyday, all-purpose machine, while even the flagship DBS is clearly a Grand Tourer at heart, though a fairly rapid one.
The Vantage RS is none of these things: it is a track-inspired, uncompromising driver's weapon that shares more conceptual ground with the most sporting Ferraris, Porsches and Lamborghinis than any Aston Martin produced in the last 40 years. Indeed you have to look back to the start of the 1960s when Aston Martin produced another road-going racing car called the DB4GT before you will find an antecedent with a similar level of focus on pure driving pleasure.
All that remains to be seen is now much of that character can be retained as the car goes through the production process which, sadly, will inevitably result in it losing power and gaining weight.
Even so, if the result is 100kg heavier and 50bhp less urgent, it seems hard to imagine that it won't still be the most exciting Aston Martin of the last generation. Aston Martin still doesn't know what the worldwide demand for the car will be, but suggests perhaps 600 cars might be built for around £150,000 each over a three-year period starting next summer. At that price and volume, I expect queues for it.
For more information go to www.channel4.com/4car/
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