A taxonomy of British cars: Rolls Royces are for heads of state, Bentleys are for the sporting aristocracy, Aston Martins are for incredibly refined playboys, and Jaguars are for the help (kidding!). But Aston has just released a car that might just disrupt its genteel image: the Aston Martin Vantage GT3, a race-ready version of the brand’s already bonkers Vantage V12.
The small car’s gargantuan 6-liter, 600-horsepower V12 has been lightened with magnesium components, and the exhaust is now titanium—this thing has more precious metals than Fort Knox, but comes out weighing 220 pounds less than its cushier brethren.
It’s hard not to notice the extensive aero package—featuring a picnic-table wing, floor-dragging side skirts and a pavement-kissing spoiler—that Aston says gives the GT3 seven times the downforce of the standard car. We thought we liked high-brow beauty of the Vantage’s pure wedge shape, but seeing it so-festooned is tickling a lobe much farther down our brain stem. In sum, the Vantage GT3 is a fall from grace into the down-and-dirty slums of racing and we have never seen a more glorious decline.