Aston Martin Vantage review

The Vantage comes in several flavours, and none disappoint. Early 4.3-litre V8 cars made a glorious noise but lacked the outright pace to really go with the urgent soundtrack, but the later 4.7 variants closed the distance between aural pleasure and actual forward motion. The Vantage is a nice balance between usability and go-faster thrills, with lovely steering and very neutral, easy-to- assimilate balance. The Vantage S (more power, harder suspension) is the one to go for if you really like driving fast on the road, the N24 race-spec variant if you want to do the odd track day. The ultimate is the musclebound V12: 510bhp, 0–62mph in 4.2secs, 190mph, a manual gearbox and a whole heap of smoky-tyred excitement. Roadsters (2007-on) tend to be more for pose than go, and you’ll pay about £8k extra to replace the roof with canvas