If it hadn't been for the DeLorean DMC-12, Marty McFly and Emmett Brown would've probably driven this instead.
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The annual Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este is a wonderful mélange of classic and modern vehicles, but the Aston Martin Bulldog blurs that line. It was made 43 years ago and yet it wouldn’t look out of place at an exhibition of current concept cars. Having been fully restored, the one-off machine with its angular styling doors attended this year’s event, showing off its digital instrument cluster belonging to an all-brown cabin draped in leather.
With massive gullwing doors and rear louvers, it’s safe to say the Bulldog has a lot going for it. As a matter of fact, entrants to the Concours felt the same way as they gave Aston Martin’s unique creation the Coppa d’Oro, one of the two awards handed out by those who sign up to the event with their prized possessions. Recently restored by UK-based Classic Motor Cars, the Bulldog belongs to car collector Phillip Sarofim, who was thrilled about winning the award:
“The win at Ville d’Este is a momentous occasion – to win such a prestigious and historic award on its first concours is a testament to CMC’s incredible work and the wild vision and engineering skill of Aston Martin. The next challenge is to get the car to 200 mph, and we will do that later this year at a location which we will announce shortly.”
Yes, the youngest car to ever win the Coppa d’Oro will try to achieve what Aston Martin promised to do but failed. Doing 200 mph in a car built more than 40 years ago sounds absolutely frightening, but the Bulldog has already reached 162 mph (261 km/h) during the first high-speed test. Even though the Bulldog was built in 1979, its specs are still amazing to this day considering it had a twin-turbo 5.3-liter V8 pushing out 600 horsepower.
Back in the day, the peeps from Gaydon said it would do 237 mph (381 km/h), but it only reached 191 mph in 1980. It was still enough to one-up the 188-mph Ferrari 512 BB, which was claimed (although never proven) to be the fastest production car at that point.