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Aston Martin Valkyrie AMR Pro production car revealed

Three years ago, Aston Martin showed what it had in mind for an extra-serious AMR Pro version of the Valkyrie hypercar. It was part of a splashy Geneva display with other supercars, and it was leading into Aston's plans to take the Valkyrie to Le Mans. Then there were financial issues, a postponement of Le Mans competition, and that whole pandemic thing. But now, the regular Valkyrie is going to reach customers soon, and Aston Martin has revealed the production version of the Valkyrie AMR Pro. Aston notes that this AMR Pro Valkyrie was developed using a lot of what the company learned from the race car program, and even going a bit beyond since the AMR Pro doesn't have to meet the rules for Le Mans. The company also brings up an expected lap time of 3 minutes 20 seconds at the Circuit de la Sarthe, the track used for 24 Hours of Le Mans. For reference, Toyota's LMP race cars with no production car roots have lapped between 3 minutes 14 seconds and 3 minutes 17 seconds. Besides being an impressive theoretical time, the racing reference has us hoping the company will one day enter the Valkyrie in the recently created hypercar class. Setting aside the Le Mans connections, the Valkyrie AMR Pro really does have some major modifications compared to the standard car. The chassis is made lighter with additional carbon fiber, such as for the suspension control arms, as well as Perspex windows. The whole car is 10.5 inches longer overall due to more aggressive aerodynamic aids that double the amount of downforce the Valkyrie produces. With it, Aston claims the Valkyrie AMR Pro can produce cornering forces as great as 3G. The wheelbase is 15 inches longer, the front track is 3.8 inches wider, and the rear track is 4.5 inches wider. As for the powertrain, the Valkyrie AMR Pro will still use a version of the 6.5-liter Cosworth V12, but unlike the standard version, the AMR Pro will ditch the electric motor and its related components. This is a move to further reduce weight. Power will also be down slightly to 1,000 horsepower. Of course, that's still a lot of power, and the 11,000-rpm redline will remain. When Aston initially showed the AMR Pro, it said it would only build 25 examples. That seems to have increased, as now Aston says it will build 40 examples, plus two prototypes. A price hasn't been given, nor has availability, but apparently deliveries will start at the end of this year, not long after the regular cars reach owners. Related Video:

007 Questions for James Bond's stunt master

You may not know the name, but you almost certainly have seen some of his work. Chris Corbould has been the special effects supervisor for every James Bond film since 1995's "GoldenEye," and has worked in some way on every one since 1977's "The Spy Who Loved Me." In between Bond movies, he's been the special effects supervisor on such low-budget indie flicks as the three Dark Knight Batman films and Star Wars episodes VII and VIII. Oh, and he won an Oscar for his work on "Inception." I was lucky enough to virtually sit down with Mr. Corbould ahead of the long-awaited release of "No Time to Die", which my colleague Zac Palmer has seen and reported back about all the cars featured in the 25th Bond movie. Mr. Corbould shared some of his experiences creating some of the most iconic stunt sequences in the series' history, including how things have changed over the years, how Bond movies are different and what it's like to not only engineer the stunts, but some of the cars featured in them. Autoblog: What's the biggest difference between working on a Bond film versus other franchise films? Chris Corbould: I think one of the big things is the history behind it. This is the 25th Bond film now and [although] we have to keep changing for the times, there's also a lot of boxes that have to be checked. There are two car chases in this, one with a DB5 in an urban environment and one with a Land Rover Defender in a very very rural environment. [We have to] come up with original ideas for those chases. But the biggest thing working on a Bond film is they always pride themselves in doing the sequences as much as they can for real. Autoblog: I actually unearthed an interview with you in 1999 where you said that "The Bond people pride themselves on STILL doing stunts for real" as opposed to CGI. And that was 22 years ago. Corbould: Yeah! I'm still saying it. Autoblog: How hard has it been to keep that ideology over the years, with changing technologies and capabilities? Corbould: It's not been hard really. The CGI guys have helped us out quite a bit by making our lives easier. They can paint cameras out, they can paint parts of rigs out if need be. The audience still has this fascination in knowing that something has been done for real as well. A lot of the big effects I've done on the James Bond films, there's as much interest in the behind the scenes of how we did the Tube train coming through the ceiling in "Skyfall", how we did the sinking house in "Casino Royale".

Check out King Charles III's $17.6 million car collection

King Charles III's coronation will take place in England on May 6, and being crowned a monarch comes with a long list of perks with four wheels. He will gain full access to the Royal Family's fleet of cars, which is valued at about GBP14 million (approximately $17.6 million). The two most expensive cars in the collection are nearly identical: they're a pair of Bentley State Limousine models (pictured) built for Queen Elizabeth II, King Charles III's mother, in 2002. Only two units were made, and they're both part of the Royal Family's fleet, so they're difficult to put a value on; it's not like one is going to end up listed on your favorite auction site anytime soon. British company Nationwide Vehicle Contracts, which compiled the list, estimates that each armored, 245-inch long sedan is worth at least GBP10,000,000 (roughly $12.6 million). Dropping below the eight-digit threshold, the second-most-valuable car in the Royal Family's fleet isn't really a car. It's the Gold State Coach, which Matchbox recently released a 1/64-scale replica of, and its value is estimated at GBP1.6 million (about $2 million). At 275 inches long it's even bigger than the Bentley limousine and it weighs about 9,000 pounds. It's 261 years old and designed to be pulled by eight horses, and has been part of every coronation since 1831. The rest of the Royal Family's vehicles are relatively mundane. There's a 1965 Aston Martin DB6 Volante that Queen Elizabeth II and her husband, Prince Phillip, bought for King Charles III on his 21st birthday. It's worth GBP1 million (about $1.2 million). The collection also includes a Rolls-Royce Phantom VI (about $627,000), a Bentley Bentayga (about $201,000), a Land Rover Range Rover long-wheelbase Landaulet ($133,000), a Jaguar XE (about $41,000), and a Land Rover Defender ($38,000). "Luxury cars have long been associated with the monarch and King Charles III, in particular, is known for his fondness of motor vehicles. His impressive collection features sentimental value with motors passed down from his late mother, Queen Elizabeth II, to cars bought for him by his parents," explained Keith Hawes, the director of Nationwide Vehicle Contracts, in an interview with CBS News. Being at the head of a car-making nation's royal family also comes with drawbacks: Every vehicle in King Charles III's fleet is British.