The retro-futuristic Aston Martin CC100.
About this time of year, car collectors start rolling out their classics at shows as diverse as Detroit’s Woodward Dream Cruise and the tony Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. The Aston Martin CC100 would likely look at home at either one – but the retro roadster is an all-new one-off designed to help celebrate the British marque’s centennial – and its 1959 victory at Le Mans.
The rakish Speedster made its formal debut at the 24 Hours of Nurburgring Race which will wrap up later today. Aston CEO Ulrich Bez took it for a lap before the launch of the endurance race.
“This car is more, even, than a simple ‘birthday present’ to ourselves,” stressed Bez said in a statement. “CC100 is the epitome of everything that is great about Aston Martin. It represents our fantastic sporting heritage, our exceptional design capability, our superb engineering know-how and, above all, our adventurous spirit.”
This image reveals the CC100's distinctive butterfly doors in operation.
The Aston Martin CC100 is powered by a 6.0-liter V-12 paired with a sequential manual gearbox. The maker isn’t revealing specific details but it should be delivering somewhere in the 500-hp range. Aston did reveal the roadster can launch from 0 to 60 in four seconds and that it will top out at around 180 mph.
While the retro styling might seem quite a step off in another direction from the current Aston line-up, CEO Bez hints the CC100 offers “teasing glimpses of potential (Aston’s) future design direction.”
Among the more intriguing details, the Aston concept features distinctive “butterfly doors,” a new interpretation of the swing doors used on current Aston models. If you can get past the retro elements, notice the updated take on the traditional Aston Martin grille, and the “negative surfaces” joining the front fenders and hood.
While the British maker was intent on marking its 100th anniversary, the project also put a spotlight on the original DR1, which scorched the European endurance circuit during the late 1950s, winning three consecutive races at the ‘Ring, starting in 1957, and capturing the checkered flag at Le Mans in 1959.
The CC100 uses carbon fiber for both its body shell and for its interior.
Aston Design Director Marek Reichman and Chief Exterior Designer Miles Nurnberger oversaw the project, working with key supplier Multimatic Inc., which created the carbon fiber body and interior. The entire program reportedly took just six months to pull together insider Aston Martin’s headquarters at Gaydon, UK.
“The brief was very simple, yet enormously testing,” explained Miles, “Create something that reflects the 100 years of Aston Martin heritage and signals the future of the brand.”
For now, the maker insists the roadster is a one-off, but there’s been a growing market for super-low volume supercars, such as the Lamborghini Veneno, of which just four will be built, and the Aston Martin One-77.
Ugly.