V8 Vantage Roadster

The V8 Vantage Roadster embodies the qualities that are integral to Aston Martin: Power, Beauty and Soul. Representing the essence of pure driving pleasure, the new Roadster is a compact sports car that offers an astonishing blend of performance and exhilaration, a car with two distinct personalities: Open and invigorating, or closed, cosseting and protective.

Sportshift

Sportshift adds electro-hydraulic control to the V8 Vantage Roadster 6-speed manual transmission to offer improved shift times and replaces the conventional manual gear lever with push button controls on the centre console to select ‘Auto Drive’, ‘Reverse’ or ‘Neutral’.

Manual gear changes are selected in Paddle Shift Mode - the new ultra-quick system provides the driver with heightened precision via fingertip control of gear changes using steering column mounted paddles, forged from lightweight magnesium, to progress smoothly and swiftly through the ratios.

Sportshift offers gear changes up to three times faster than the standard manual transmission already available, with the driving enthusiast able to access precision gearshifts in around 200m/s. To adapt to all driving conditions, an additional 'Comfort' mode offering a more relaxed gear change features which is selected via a single button on the centre console.

Sportshift functionality is also enhanced with a low speed ‘crawl’ feature, which acts as a manoeuvring aid, gently engaging the clutch to move the car up to 4mph - allowing the driver to focus on positioning rather than throttle control when parking. Additionally, Sportshift includes a user-selected ‘Auto Drive’ mode, which, when operated, will take full control of the timing of all changes and select the appropriate gear for all conditions.

Equipped with Sportshift, the Vantage Roadster retains its low polar moment of inertia and excellent balance, with a negligible increase in overall weight and minimal impact to the Roadster's optimal 49:51 weight distribution. Equally, top end performance is unchanged, at 280 km/h (175 mph).