Aston Martin Valour revealed

The 2023 Aston Martin Valour is the company’s 110th birthday present to itself – a limited-edition, retro-design, rear-wheel drive manual V12 monster that will make its public debut at the Goodwood Festival of Speed today.

If the exterior design looks familiar, that’s because it’s a facsimile of the one-off Victor built for an Aston Martin VIP in 2020, a modern interpretation of the 1980s Vantage, a favourite of James Bond in period.

It’s a muscle car taken to an upper-class British finishing school, with highlights including a giant clamshell bonnet and a super-wide rear-end to accommodate 325mm tyres and 21-inch honeycomb wheels that also appear on the DBS 770 Ultimate.

The engine is also shared with the DBS. Unlike the Victor, which used the incredible Cosworth-built 7.7-litre V12 from the Aston Martin One-77, the Valour ‘makes do’ with a 5.2-litre twin-turbo V12 producing 526kW/753Nm.

These outputs are actually less than the 566kW/900Nm produced by the DBS 770 Ultimate, but that’s due to the limitations of the Valour’s USP, a six-speed manual transmission. Aston proudly boasts the Valour is now the only front-engined V12 manual on the market.

Significant body reinforcement including front and rear shear panels, rear strut tower brace and fuel tank bracing, plus a bespoke suspension set-up and new steering system are said to improve dynamics, though Aston claims the Valour is tuned with road compliance rather than track competency in mind.

Giant carbon-ceramic brakes – 410mm front discs with six-piston callipers and 360mm rear discs with four-piston callipers – provide the appropriate stopping power and save 23kg compared to steel equivalents, while the ultra-thin exhaust reduces weight by a further 7kg.

As a nod to the birthday celebrations, just 110 examples of the Valour will be built, but no price tag has been announced. That’s partly because it’s largely irrelevant and partly because each car will be bespoke to the owner’s wishes with a huge array of customisation available.

The gearknob can be aluminium, titanium, carbon-fibre or walnut, the seats can be trimmed in leather, tweed or cashmere, and there are limitless paint options or you can forgo them completely, opting for naked carbon with a red, blue or green tint.

Development has been completed on the Valour and production is expected to start imminently, ahead of first deliveries in the fourth quarter of 2023.

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