Photo credit: Classic Motor Cars Limited
Deciding to call a car designed to break a record “Bulldog” is a bizarre choice considering they are clumsy and slow dogs. Towards the end of the 70s, Aston Martin, which was going through a difficult period, decided to focus on promoting the result of a land speed record above those set by its direct competitors: Ferrari 512BB and Lamborghini Countach: 200 miles per hour, 322 km/h.
To achieve this, they designed the Bulldog, powered by the first turbocharged engine to come out of Gaydon, a twin Garrett AirResearch turbocharged 5.3-litre V8 engine, mounted centrally.
Stylistically, the car followed the trend of the moment, which gave it its particular wedge shape. The car also featured an innovative fairing hiding its five centre-mounted headlamps, and electrically operated gull-wing doors. The promise to exceed 200 miles per hour, however, was a little too bold. It did manage to reach 191mph (307 km/h), but this moral defeat dented the credibility of the brand and forced William Towns and Mike Loasby to leave the company. And so it was that the idea to produce a limited series of the Bulldog found itself without internal sponsors and the model remained a unique example.
Today, more than 40 years later, the collector Philip Sarofim, the current owner of the car, will entrust a professional driver with the task of achieving the result they couldn’t reach at the time. We’ll have to wait and see if a completely restored “Bulldog” can exceed 322 km/h. It would certainly be a sweet revenge for… the breed!
