Aston Martin is making a baby hypercar
We’re yet to even see the production version of the mad Aston Martin Valkyrie – the naturally aspirated, 1000+bhp hypercar built in collaboration with the brainiest brainbox in the biz, Adrian Newey – let alone drive it. Yet Aston Martin is already bringing us news of its next hypercar: ‘Project 003’. Which, we’ve got to be honest, we’re not upset about, because there can never be enough hypercars in the world right?
It’ll be the third hypercar from Aston Martin, coming sometime in 2021 – after the Valkyrie has come off the line as well as its track-only, F1-baiting offspring, the Valkyrie AMR Pro. There’s not a load of info currently, and only that fag-packet sketch below, but what we do know is that it’ll take all of Adrian Newey’s nous and distil it down into a cheaper, more accessible and road-biased form. Well, you’re not going to waste his kind of knowledge, are you?
Built around a carbon structure, it’ll be powered by a turbocharged petrol-electric hybrid set-up. It’ll more than likely be a six-cylinder engine, though it could possibly be an eight. But, we’ve heard rumours the hybrid drivetrain will be more advanced than the Valkyrie’s, this time running off the front axle. That’d make 003 four-wheel-drive and open up the potential for clean, silent stints of EV running. It’ll also be slightly heavier than a Valkyrie as a result; in the region of 1,300kg, we’d suspect.
Performance? Yep, it’ll have it. With the benefit of power to all four wheels and potentially an F1-style gearbox, we’d guess a 0-100kph that’s sub three seconds is possible, alongside a top speed that easily puts it in the 322kph club.
Like its bigger brother, 003 will have a crazy, typically Adrian aero package, including active aero and suspension settings for gut-busting cornering forces. But it’ll also be more of a road car. Well, a tiny bit more. We’re told there’ll be “more practical concessions to road use”, including a luxury Aston calls “luggage space”. However, unlike the Valkyrie, it’ll be for all the rich people of the world. Well, not everyone, as only 500 will be built, but it’ll be fully homologated and available in all markets in both left- and right-hand drive. The price? At least £1million (RM5.5m).
“It was always the intention for the Aston Martin Valkyrie to be a once-in-a-lifetime project,” Aston’s President and Group Chief Executive, Andy Palmer said. “However, it was also vital to us that Valkyrie would create a legacy: a direct descendant that would also set new standards within its own area of the hypercar market, creating a bloodline of highly specialised, limited production machines that can exist in parallel with Aston Martin’s series production models.”
But geez, Louise. Aston Martin’s team are surely the busiest bees in the business right now. In the past few months, it’s announced a £7m Zagato twin-pack (a continuation of the legendary, sumptuous DB4 GT Zagato, plus a brand-new DBS-based special), teased its electric future, built a one-off V8 Cygnet and mused over other fripperies like Bond-spec toys; an electric inter-city personal aircrafts and a submarine. Not to mention actually putting the gadget-laden Goldfinger DB5 into production.
Remember, they’re dealing with all that plus the normal bread-and-butter stuff like launching a new Vantage and making sure people buy DB11s to keep the business turning over. But Aston’s not content with slowing down, and this Project 003 is just another car being fired out of the Aston Martin Gatling gun. Remember, that there’s also a Le Mans racecar to come (more than likely born out of the 003, given the timing of its arrival), then a mid-engined Ferrari 488/Lamborghini Huracan rival, the DBX and a new Lagonda. This all costs money, so expect more money-spinning continuations, one-offs and twin-packs to come, peeps.