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Aston Martin will race the Valkyrie hypercar at Le Mans in 2021

Aston Martin will challenge for outright victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours race in 2021 with its Valkyrie hypercar, the British luxury sportscar maker announced on Friday after race organizers rewrote the rules. The governing FIA, who oversee the World Endurance Championship, and race organizers Automobile Club de L'Ouest, revealed earlier that hypercar derivatives would replace prototypes as the top category starting in the 2020-21 season. Aston Martin will field two works Valkyries, powered by V12 normally-aspirated engines, as part of a multi-year commitment to a championship currently dominated by Japanese manufacturer Toyota. The announcement comes 60 years after Aston Martin's sole overall triumph at Le Mans in 1959 with Britain's Roy Salvadori and American Carroll Shelby. Le Mans winner Toyota, meanwhile, has committed to staying in the WEC after 2020 subsequent to the hypercar rules. The Japanese manufacturer said in a statement before this weekend's race at Le Mans' Sarthe circuit that it would continue in 2021 with a hybrid-powered prototype based on the GR Super Sport road car. Track testing of the new car will begin next year. Defending champions Toyota will start on pole position on Saturday after sweeping the front row in qualifying for the third year in succession. "This new era of competition is a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate our credentials not only as a race team against some of the best in the business, but also as a sportscar manufacturer," said Toyota Gazoo president Shigeki Tomoyama. The 2021 Le Mans will also be the 100th anniversary of Aston's first entry at the Circuit de la Sarthe. "I think you'd say from the brand's point of view, there's a little bit of unfinished business to be done," Group Chief Executive Andy Palmer told Reuters. Top Formula One designer Adrian Newey, who has won championships with Williams, McLaren and Red Bull, helped create the Valkyrie. The limited edition road legal version costs in the region of 2.5 million pounds ($3.17 million). "We don't under-estimate the difficulty of an outright win at Le Mans and you never under-estimate the tenacity and resources of Toyota," said Palmer. "On the other hand, we're not coming just to make up the numbers. We're coming here to give it a bloody good shot." Palmer said the new regulations would significantly reduce the costs of competing, without giving details about the likely budget, and hoped commercial rivals McLaren and Ferrari would take up the challenge.

1965 Aston Martin DB5 Shooting Brake: Rare, stylish, practical, and up for auction

Have you ever looked at a 1965 Aston Martin DB5 and thought, "I would totally buy one, but it's just not practical enough." If so, we're a little surprised, but at least you're not alone. According to RM Sotheby's, David Brown, the man who ran Aston Martin for several decades and started the line of DB models that continues today, felt similarly. Apparently he couldn't fit his polo gear into a regular Aston coupe, and he wanted somewhere for his dog to sit that would keep it from tearing up the seats. As such, the Aston Martin DB5 shooting brake was created for him and a few wealthy customers by coachbuilder Harold Radford. The grand total was 12. One of those 12 cars is going up for auction by RM Sotheby's. It's one of four built with left-hand drive and was sold to a Swiss buyer who optioned it with a power antenna, seat belts, passenger-side head rest, air horns and initials on the doors. The car has had two other owners and has gone through a couple restorations. The second owner picked it up in 2003 and had it restored by Aston Engineering, which bumped the displacement from 4.0 liters to 4.2 and replaced the factory automatic with a 5-speed manual. The second owner acquired it in 2009 and upped the displacement even further to 4.7 liters along with upgraded shocks and springs. The car will be auctioned at RM Sotheby's Monterey event during the week of the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. The company expects it to sell for between $1,000,000 and $1,400,000. Considering the rarity of the car, that doesn't seem terrible, but according to the Hagerty price guide, it's rather high. It values the DB5 Shooting Brake at $790,000 for a concours-quality car. For reference, Hagerty values a concours-quality DB5 coupe at $1,450,000.

Aston Martin to keep the faith with V12, manual transmission

Downsized engines and dual-clutch transmissions may be the way the industry is heading, but Aston Martin is more deeply rooted in the past than most. Which could explain – at least in part – why the British automaker is planning on sticking with V12 engines and manual transmissions for the foreseeable future. After speaking with Aston's new chief executive Andy Palmer at the Geneva Motor Show last week, Car and Driver reports that Gaydon is in no rush to get rid of the building blocks that have made it what it is today. And that means continuing to evolve its VH architecture, twelve-cylinder engine and six-speed manual gearbox. The company is working to develop a new platform and is collaborating on a new twin-turbo V8 with Mercedes-AMG. But those are still several years out, and Aston doesn't plan to wait that long before rolling out new models. Before the new AMG-powered Vantage is ready, C/D reports that Aston will introduce the replacement for the DB9 that will still be based on the VH platform and pack an evolution of the company's ubiquitous and long-serving 6.0-liter V12. "That platform was definitely far ahead of its time," Palmer told C/D. "It should have been described as a modular architecture, like [VW's] MQB or one of the other systems big manufacturers have adopted. We're always making excuses about it being an old platform, but if you were to compare the original VH platform to today's there's an enormous transformation. And it's a great way to build cars in the volumes that we do." The platform and the engine aren't the only old-school technologies Palmer is intent to keep. While Ferrari and Lamborghini do away with the manual altogether, and even Porsche goes PDK-only on the 911 GT3 and GT3 RS, Aston isn't giving up its clutch pedal any time soon. "I would love to be the last car manufacturer providing stick shifts in the U.S.," said Palmer. "That's my hope, we will keep the faith." Of course part of that could come down to Aston not having a dual-clutch transmission to offer, while its antiquated sequential gearbox lags behind the times. But it will likely gain access to Mercedes transmissions along with the engine deal.