© DW Burnett/Puppyknuckles
It turns out that a snow-covered track is a perfect environment for this Aston. Just be sure not to overestimate your talent.
Confidence can be a dangerous thing. I was feeling pretty good about myself out on the snow-covered road course of the Monticello Motor Club road course, pulling big yaw angles with the Aston Martin Vantage Roadster, making it look nice for the camera just as the snow was giving way to ice. You see where this is going: carrying too much speed down a particularly slick part of the track and into a snowbank, pushing in the mesh grille and cracking the carbon-fiber splitter. Oops.
No racing-driver excuses here: this was entirely my fault and in no way a reflection on the lovely Aston, which is an absolute riot on a loose surface.
© DW Burnett/Puppyknuckles
aston martin vantage roadster in snow
A snowed-in road course on a 19-degree February day is an unlikely environment for a convertible, let alone the gorgeous Ceramic Blue Aston Martin Vantage Roadster. But it's also a great environment to explore a side of this car that is not typically experienced. And hey, it was on winter tires, and Aston Martin, wisely or not given the writer, agreed to let us slide it around.
Aston Martin is very proud to have created the quickest soft-top in the auto industry, at least where the deployment is concerned; the canvas goes up or down in seven seconds. It also gets points for being operable in temperatures as low as 14 degrees when 40 is the norm. Naturally, we dropped it down for maximum comedic effect. Thankfully, in the best English sports car tradition, it has a great heater. And the Vantage doesn't suffer in its transformation from coupe to Roadster, gaining only 132 pounds and still feeling quite rigid across the truly horrible winter-scarred New York roads on the way to the track. Not to mention that it's a truly stunning car, especially with the roof down.
The addition of a soft top shifted the coupe's 50:50 weight balance to 49:51 front-to-rear, but balance is still what this Aston is all about. Out in the snow, you can revel in the neutral chassis balance of the Vantage, provoke the rear with just a little bit of throttle, use your right foot to manage your drift angle. It feels incredibly intuitive to slide, like a Miata with the world's richest-smelling leather.
Of course, you need an engine to get the car sliding in the first place, and there are far worse engines than AMG's 4.0-liter V-8. This engine has created some controversy in the Vantage, since it's the same unit used in the Mercedes-AMG GT. The cars are hardly twins, but they have the same basic mechanical layout and similar price points, which complicates life for the Aston. But viewed simply as a tool, it's excellent, with abundant torque throughout the rev range and no perceptible turbo lag. In these conditions, you can start and hold a slide in third, sometimes even fourth gear, with the low-end response of this V-8. And it sounds fantastic, growling at low revs, shouting when you use more to kick up some powder. Plus, shifters mounted to the steering column rather than the wheel itself allow you to upshift mid-slide, and the smoothness of the ZF eight-speed transaxle won't upset the car.
My only real complaint in regards to the Vantage out here are its Pirelli tires. They're an Aston-spec version of the Sottozero Serie II, a tire that was first launched in 2008 and subsequently replaced by the Sottozero 3 and P-Zero Winter. While I wouldn't call the Sottozero Serie IIs bad, tire technology has moved along a lot in the last decade. We had a C8 Corvette on Michelin's latest Pilot Alpin PA4s at Monticello on the same day, and those tires remained much softer and offered more progressive breakaway. I think the Aston would really benefit from a more modern winter tire, and I'm not just saying that because I shunted the car. Also, I recognize that Aston has bigger priorities than trying to develop a new winter tire for a car most snow-belt owners will put away from November to March.
© DW Burnett/Puppyknuckles
aston martin vantage roadster in snow
This was a testing environment for the Aston. Monticello head driving instructor (and patron saint of"Hell yeah, dude!") Chris Duplessis described it as a rally stage, but wider. There was a healthy amount of freshly plowed snow in the morning, but rampant hooliganry and sliding the same corner over and over for photography left patches of tarmac visible among tons of ice, just like you'd get on a snowy rally stage. We really needed studded tires; the surface eventually got so slick, I nearly fell over while just walking near where I stuffed the car. Duplessis, a rally champion, was leaving the Aston in fifth for some corners, the engine barely above idle. Yet the rear tires were carving a wider line than the fronts.
This was about as extreme a test as we could've put the Aston through without exceeding 45 mph, and there's really no practical consumer advice to be gleaned here, except maybe skip the carbon splitter if you're worried about hard snowbanks. But what we have learned is that the Vantage is remarkably accomplished in what must be the place furthest removed from the Pacific Coast Highway. There's joy in the absurdity of it all, an Aston Martin with all its leather and gorgeous lacquered enamel badges being able to hang in Subaru WRX country.
© DW Burnett/Puppyknuckles
aston martin vantage roadster in snow
It's good to have a reminder that a sports car can provide plenty of joy in the winter months. You'll need to spend some extra time cleaning the grime off, but it's worth it to see snow caked up on the diffuser. It's a wonderfully absurd sight.
Just be mindful of the amount of grip (and talent) you have underneath you.
Thanks to Monticello Motor Club for the track time!