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Drive an Aston Martin | The List #0568

Few cars can drum up feelings of intrigue like an Aston Martin. On this episode of The List, hosts Jessi Combs and Patrick McIntyre travel to England, the birthplace of Aston Martin, to drive the V12 Vanquish and learn more about this luxurious brand. From exploring narrow country roads to braving a rain storm on the track, we put this beautiful British sports car to the test. The 2016 V12 Vanquish is a sight to behold no matter the road, but there's something special about driving it around England. We visited the Aston Martin Works in Newport Pagnell, the site of an Aston factory from 1954 - 2007, to learn more about the brand's past. From the DB4 all the way to the Vanquish, the beauty of these hand-built machines has stayed consistent throughout their history. After admiring the classics, it was time to push the shiny new Vanquish to its limits on the track. Fighting through intermittent rain didn't make it easy. "Getting a little squirrelly for sure," said a visibly excited Patrick. "Too much. Way too much on that one." When it was Jessi's turn, her self-proclaimed lead foot actually led her to an interesting conclusion about the vehicle. Because of the subpar track conditions and because the car is in fact a grand tourer, Jessi actually makes that claim that "I think I'd rather have it out on the open road." Regardless of environment or driving conditions, it's certain that the Vanquish is an incredibly impressive machine. Perhaps most importantly, it helped us check "Drive An Aston Martin" off of our List. Click here to find more episodes of The List Click here to learn more about our hosts, Jessi and Patrick Aston Martin Luxury Performance Supercars The List Videos Original Video aston martin vanquish

2018 Aston Martin DB11 AMR Review | A private world of comfort and speed

There are moments when miniscule adjustments to something wonderful can yield unforeseen enhancements. The addition of a dash of Maraschino liqueur to a perfect Manhattan. The application of a few Newton-meters more pressure in a deep tissue massage. Gold-plating the wire wheels on your Commodore Blue Continental Package-equipped 1985 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz Convertible. So it is with the Aston Martin DB11 AMR, a slight tweak to the Aston Martin DB11 V12 — already one of our favorite grand tourers. The non-AMR DB11 hosts the ideal combination of profligate luxury, recherche exclusivity, and muscular performance. (The V8 is also ... fine.) But Aston Martin's new AMR performance sub-brand has drizzled its speed effluent onto the DB's componentry and software. The result borders on transcendent. AMR was launched at the Geneva Motor Show in 2017 as the storied British marque's go-fast subsidiary (its M or AMG, if you will). Inspired in name, if not in mission, by the Aston Martin Racing team, it has already resulted in the AMR-ization of a half-dozen Aston vehicles including iterations of the Rapide, Vulcan, Valkyrie, and previous-generation Vantage. The $241,000 DB11 is the seventh in that series, and it will take the place of the "base" DB11 V12 when it appears in the states later this summer. Since Aston recently opened the first of its fancy-pants AMR Performance Centers adjacent to Germany's famed Nurburgring racetrack, it seemed fitting that our test drive of the new car commence there. We snagged the DB's crystal-tipped key fob and spent a couple days tearing everywhere in the Rhineland region that wasn't the "Ring," including narrow wending mountain roads, expertly paved two-lane byways, and unlimited Autobahn uber-highways. AMR's sorcery has, as noted, yielded relatively small changes on paper. The twin-turbocharged 5.2-liter 12-cylinder now makes just 5 percent more horses, for a total of 630. The dampers and springs have been stiffened by about 10 percent, the anti-roll bars front and rear by half that and half again. More rigid engine and transmission mounts have been added for greater stolidity. The transmission has been remapped for increased differentiation across the GT, Sport, and Sport Plus driving modes, selectable via a switch on the right side of the steering wheel.

The mood at this year’s Paris Motor Show: Quiet

The Paris Motor Show, held every other year in the early fall, typically kicks off the annual cavalcade of automotive conclaves, one that traverses the globe between autumn and spring, introducing projective, conceptual and production-ready vehicle models to the international automotive press, automotive aficionados and a public hungry for news of our increasingly futuristic mobility enterprise. But this year, at the press preview days for the show, the grounds of the Porte de Versailles convention center felt a bit more sparsely populated than usual. This was not simply a subjective sensation, or one influenced by the center's atypically dispersed assemblage of seven discrete buildings, which tends to spread out the cars and the crowds. There were not only fewer new vehicles being premiered in Paris this year, there were fewer manufacturers there to display them. Major mainstream European OEM stalwarts such as Alfa Romeo, Fiat, Nissan and Volkswagen chose to sit out Paris this year, as did boutique manufacturers like Bentley, Aston Martin and Lamborghini. This is not simply based in some antipathy on the part of the German, British and Italian manufacturers toward the French market — though for a variety of historical and societal reasons that market may be more dominated by vehicles produced domestically than others. Rather, it is part of a larger trend in the industry. Last year, Mercedes-Benz announced that it would not be participating in the flagship North American International Auto Show in 2019 — and that it might not return. Other brands including Jaguar/Land Rover, Audi, Porsche, Mazda and nearly every exotic carmaker have also departed the Detroit show. Some of these brands will still appear in the city in which the show is taking place, and host an event offsite, to capitalize on the presence of a large number of reporters in attendance. And even brands that do have a presence at the show have shifted their vehicle introductions to the days before the official press opening in an attempt to stand out from the crowd. In many ways, this makes sense. With an expanding number of automakers, with diversification and niche-ification of models and with wholesale shifts that necessitate the introduction of EV or autonomous sub-brands, there is a growing sense that, with everyone shouting at the same time, no one can be heard.