Aston Martin Valiant is a revival of 80s brutalism

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The 2025 Aston Martin Valiant is the racing-inspired edition of the amazing Limited Edition Valor.

The Valiant has an all-carbon fiber body, a six-speed transmission, and a 5. 3-liter twin-turbo V-12 with 734 horsepower.

The first visitor deliveries of the Valiant are expected to begin by the end of the year and production will be limited to 38 units worldwide.

The other day, at Aston Martin’s “Q” personal customization lounge in Midtown Manhattan, we had the opportunity to see a preview of the brand’s new “Special”. According to the V-shaped nomenclature of the venerable British brand, it is called Valiant. Inspired in part by the wild-style, wide-body, blade-to-head “Muncher,” a forced-induction tracked edition of the brand’s 1970s DBS V-8, this $2. 5 million matte gold missile (for starters) is a run. -Inspired iteration of the recent Valor.

The Valiant was originally created at the request of Aston’s F1 driver Fernando Alonso, who, after spending time with the Valor, asked the team to create a car that, according to Simon Newton, the brand’s head of vehicle dynamics, would “take the mass out of the road and make it more fun, more sporty.

These come with an all-carbon fiber body, a 5. 3-liter twin-turbo V-12 and, delightfully, a six-speed manual transmission. But in this application, the 12-cylinder engine makes 734 horsepower, the most powerful manual/V-12 combination featured in any of these limited-production Astons.

Visually, the car is more competitive than the already dominant Valor. Most notable is the giant rear wing, which rises like a true St. Louis arc from the razor-shaped flared rear fenders, and appears to have spread by coupling the spoiler of a 1970 Plymouth Superbird with that of a 2010 Nissan. GT-R.

“Anything this brutal will get attention among brand traditionalists,” says Alex Long, head of product and market strategy at Aston. “We haven’t made pronounced wings or aerodynamic features like our older DB series cars, like the DB5 through the DB12. But we had a more obtuse design phase in the late 1970s and 1980s, and that’s reflected in visitor requests, because our clients in charge now are other people who grew up in that era. And it changes what other people are looking for in their collections.

Other notable additions include a set of windproof “fences” on the front lower divider and in front of the rear wheels, graphic hubcaps, and a forged grille on the rear window that Newton calls “the armadillo. “This exclusive series of windswept drill bits offers the Valiant is an ambitious quality tuner that breaks the barriers of this worthy brand.

This is intentional, meant to shake up the brand’s perceived decorousness. “Aston has always been famous for beauty and design. But true top-in-class performance was never a reality,” says Long. “Now we are really pushing that boundary. We race in F1. Performance is a pillar now.”

To keep the car glued to the asphalt at the sacrifice of all Aston compliance, the Valiant also uses Multimatic adaptive reel dampers. These straps are “adjustable with wonderful precision,” Newton says, “good for comfort and ideal for controlling the wheel. “in case of contact with tires. “

The purpose of mass suppression resulted in a titanium exhaust, a magnesium torsion pipe and wheels, a 3D-published rear subframe, and a lithium-ion battery for motorsports. This also resulted in a sleek interior with fewer sound-absorbing materials. it even loses extra weight, or something like that, via the archaic edition of Mercedes’ infotainment system that’s been at Astons for the past decade, rather than the updated edition that was recently released to the company’s lineup. In total, the car weighs about 250 pounds less than the Valor.

The Valiant will make its first public appearance at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, where Alonso himself will drive the car on the estate’s outstanding climb. The first deliveries for visitors are expected to be made by the end of 2024. Production will be limited to 38 units worldwide, adding a dozen reserved for the North American market. Unfortunately, even if all of us at Car and Driver put together our collective net worth, we still wouldn’t be able to qualify for a purchase, as all 38 cars are already reserved.

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