Glorious Aston Martin V600 Le Mans for sale

This era of Vantage never raced at the 24H - doesn't make it any less of a Le Mans legend

There’s still a whole year of racing to go until the Aston Martin enters the V12 Valkyrie into the World Endurance Championship, fulfilling its destiny to become an outright challenger at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Sure, Aston’s been cleaning up at la Sarthe for many years now in the ever-changing GT categories, but the marque returning to the headline class - with a naturally aspirated V12 racer loosely based on a road car - is a novelty that’s unlikely to ever wear off.

After all, no matter how cool and successful its many GT racers were, only Le Mans bores like myself remember who finished where in GTE Pro in any given year. To go down as one of the greats, you need an outright win. That’s why Aston Martin hasn’t released any Le Mans edition models inspired by its multiple GT victories at the 24-hour race, with all its throwbacks paying homage to its one-and-only win at la Sarthe in 1959. More recently, it was the DBS Superleggera 59, stuffed full of all sorts of Easter eggs relating to the trio of DBR1s entered in the 1959 race. But the coolest of the lot has to be the Vantage V600 Le Mans you see here.

The Vantage Le Mans would not only commemorate the 40th anniversary of Roy Salvadori and Carroll Shelby’s win, but it’d also call time on Aston’s bonkers brute. To send the Vantage off in style, each of the 40 Le Mans editions built was fitted with an even more radical body kit than the base car, with a deeper front splitter, blanked-out grille and reprofiled side vents that mimic the race winner. Five-spoke magnesium alloy wheels were standard fit (and hollow), and most were finished in Aston Martin Racing Green to help justify the name. All of that culminated in a wonderfully thuggish look, the absolute polar opposite of the gorgeously sleek DBR1.

Subtlety was never the Vantage’s thing, anyway, especially once Aston Martin Works devised the ultimate V600 package. Some of the Vantage Le Mans received it from factory, others were retrofitted, but the outcome was startling either way; power from the 5.3-litre, twin-Eaton supercharged V8 engine leapt from 558hp to 612hp, slashing the Vantage’s 0-62mph figure from 4.6 seconds to 3.9 upping the top speed to in excess of 199mph. Thankfully, the package also included beefier AP Racing brakes, Eibach springs and adjustable Koni dampers, all of which do their very best to stop the lightest of throttle inputs from spitting you into the hedgerow.

Inside, however, it’s a completely different story. There’s wood veneer on the dashboard, leather around the Ford Crown Victoria-sourced steering wheel, and while there is some Alcantara it’s strictly limited to the centre of the seats. So, really, the whole purpose of the Vantage Le Mans was to get you to the Circuit de la Sarthe in record time, rather than drive around it. In fact, all cars left the factory with a map from the UK to Le Mans, which would come in handy for Aston’s return to Le Mans some (checks notes) half a decade later.

Take the Le Mans connection away, mind, and you’re still left with one of the coolest Aston’s of the 1999s, if not of all time. And given its limited production, it certainly won’t come cheap. You’ll need to give the seller a bell to find out how much they want for this 21,000-mile car, chassis number 12, although the £495,000 asking price of this even lower mileage example should give you a ballpark figure to go in with. Granted, you could grab this V550 for considerably less and use the rest of the money in fuel, but then there would always be a part of you wondering just how bonkers 600hp of twin-turbocharged leather and veneer would feel...

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GreatScott2016

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