Aston Martin Vantage GT8: Spotted

Want to celebrate Aston's historic Le Mans victory? You're spoilt for choice with the PH classifieds!

For a good few years now, the Aston V8 Vantages have been crowd favourites at the Le Mans 24 Hours. Partly that will be due to a hoard of patriotic Brits pledging their support, but also just because they're very cool racing cars: they look great, they sound even better and, well, they're quite successful too. As last weekend proved.

It was the last LM for this era of V8 Vantage too, giving the GTE Pro win even greater significance. Nothing like going out on a high, right? And for anyone who thinks motorsport doesn't have an impact on sales, sit up at the Dunlop curves as the sun goes down, listen to a V8 Vantage GTE and see how long you can stay out of the classifieds.

We didn't last long. While Aston very recently launched the AMR special editions to tie-in with Le Mans, the GT8 is perhaps the most faithful homage to the works race cars. The track is wider, the aero much improved and various lightweight options - plastic windows, forged wheels and a titanium exhaust - give it some motorsport credibility. We described it as "raw, raucous and unashamedly aggressive." The 150 made sold out very quickly, and that was that, Aston's focus predictably turning to the next product.

What if you missed out on a GT8 though? What if that Le Mans victory has you fired up for a purchase, or you want to celebrate brilliant V8s while you still can? Then you need to check the PH classifieds. From that production run of 150, 40 are apparently in the UK. At the time of writing, 13 are available, with six at Aston Martin dealers and this car being the most affordable at £243,000. Yikes.

It's difficult to assess what's good value as far as GT8s go, simply because the options list was so extensive. The list price was £165,000, but this car is said to have been specced up to £222,000. This GT8 is probably our favourite from those available though, painted DBR9 Green (but without stripes) and keeping the standard manual gearbox. Nice.

However it's £260,000, which opens up plenty of other choices for motorsport-inspired road cars. It's not often that a Porsche Motorsport product is the more affordable secondhand purchase, but there are a wealth of GT3 RS 991s available - this Gulf Orange car is at Porsche Silverstone with less than 700 miles for £235,000. And while you would have to have a left-hand drive car with more miles, a 458 Speciale is just in budget too. Yes, it's a 488 that races at the moment, but the Speciale is still worth consideration. And if left-hand drive is OK, then you could track down a Corvette as well...

Certainly then, those buyers after a super sports-cum-track car do have some tricky decisions to make. And perhaps now isn't the best time to buy a GT8. But it does have that look, that noise and that manual gearbox option too. It's also incredibly rare, even by these standards. Combine all that with the LM kudos and that should be most of the convincing done...

ASTON MARTIN V8 VANTAGE GT8
Engine: 4,735cc V8
Transmission: 6-speed manual, RWD, limited-slip differential
Power (hp): 446@7,300
Torque (lb ft): 361@5,000rpm
MPG: N/A
CO2: N/A
Recorded mileage: 170 miles
Year registered: 2017
Pricenew: £165,000 (before options)
Price now: £260,000

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cib24

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