Sketched drawings of imaginary sports cars covered my notebook as an elementary school pupil. Assembled in the ether of a daydream, each penciled design came from an imagination unrestrained by reality, with nary a concession to things like outward visibility, bumper heights or ground clearance. Engines were huge, tires were wide and bodywork was unbelievably sleek. It didn’t matter that none of the drawings represented real cars. From my naive perspective, I could bring the world’s coolest cars to life in two-dimensional black and white.
Thirty years later, I find myself sitting in the driver’s seat of a 2011 Aston Martin V12 Vantage. To a car guy, this artful amalgamate of aluminum, magnesium, carbon fiber, leather, rubber and glass represents pure sensory overload. As a jaded automotive journalist, I’m supposed to maintain a poker face when presented with such an objet d’art. Plainly, I am struggling today.
