F1 world champion and the current Aston Martin F1 team’s star driver, Fernando Alonso, had a taste of Aston’s emergency recovery while cruising the streets of Monaco in his $3 million F1 car for the road. One of very few that fall into the niche, the Valkyrie is an extremely complex V12-powered hypercar using a lot of actual F1 technology. So while it’s unfortunate that Alonso suffered a breakdown in his Valkyrie in his chosen home of Monaco, it isn’t entirely unexpected.
In a video uploaded by the YouTube channel, Pistons Brothers, we see Alonso behind the wheel of his Valkyrie following a camera crew in a car. Given how loud the naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12 gets in the car, Alonso has a safety headset on to help cut down on the reportedly unbearable decibels.
Sadly, the next we see of the 1-of-150 hypercar is it being winched onto the back of a tow truck. Surrounding the car are a team of technicians, including one sitting in the car and diagnosing what went wrong with a laptop.
It could be any number of things really, considering the high-strung nature of the engine: the Cosworth-built V12 is the world’s most powerful naturally aspirated road-going car engine. The engine itself is a work of art, milled from a solid block of aluminum, and using F1-spec pistons to make for one of the lightest V12s in the world at 454 pounds.
Adding to that, the battery-electric system developed by Rimac is equivalent to an F1 car’s KERS system. Aston Martin’s Valkyrie customer deliveries have been reportedly plagued by electrical gremlins, something the company’s quite obviously working hard to sort out.
That aside, let’s just admire the Valkyrie for what it is: an engineering marvel. The engine itself puts out over 1,000 horsepower, and with the electric motor, the combined output is 1,140 horsepower. Torque is a heady 681 lb-ft, and the redline stands at 11,100rpm with shifts coming via a 7-speed sequential single-clutch gearbox. Performance is impressive: 0-60mph is an estimated 2.2 seconds, with a top speed limited to 250mph.
The Valkyrie was designed by F1-car designer Adrian Newey and uses a lot of technology derived from F1 like the carbon fiber tub chassis, inboard suspension, seating position, and more. Still, it’s easy to drive with no clutch to worry about — the Valkyrie gets away from a standstill using the electric motor. The mighty V12 powers the wheels at anything over crawl speeds, with the electric motor switching to torque fill duties.
Whether you buy into the whole “F1 car for the road” hype about cars like Aston Martin Valkyrie or not, one thing’s for sure: the Valkyrie’s roadside assistance program certainly looks like the closest thing you can get to a personal pit crew for the road. It should be, though: maintaining an Aston Valkyrie could cost up to $450,000 over three years of ownership.
