Apex
Weekly.

New Italian outfit Vespera Automobili unveiled the Iride Evo 5, a carbon-bodied Mercedes 190E Evo II restomod: 765 hp and 910 Nm from a turbocharged 3.0-litre M103 straight-six. 1,450 kg, 0-100 in 3.4 seconds, 300 km/h — through a six-speed manual.

Vespera rebuilt the DTM-era W201 Evolution II around a widened carbon-fibre body, adding 10 cm per side with box fender flares, a deep splitter and a towering rear wing. The original Mercedes M103 six was bored to 3.0 litres and fitted with forged internals and a large single turbo. The debut car wears Alfa Romeo Montreal Green over gold OZ Racing rally wheels and was developed with input from MotoGP legend Loris Capirossi. Each car is hand-built to order; pricing is expected at or above the rival HWA EVO, which starts around $770,000 with 493 hp. That makes Vespera's take the most powerful 190E Evo II revival yet.

The 190E Evo II has exploded in collector value, and two rival restomod programs are now fighting over it. Vespera's pitch is pure: more power than the HWA, three pedals, 1,450 kg.

Read the original at Carscoops →

RM Sotheby's offers a 1937 Bugatti Type 57SC Atalante at Monterey on 13 August, estimate $4.5-6M. Just 42 Type 57S chassis were built, only 17 wore Jean Bugatti's Atalante coupe body — and chassis 57551 is 1 of 4 with the lowered headlights of the Paris show car.

The 57S was Bugatti's lowered, competition-bred chassis: 3.3-litre straight-eight, dry sump, magneto ignition — a genuine supercar of 1937 that won Le Mans and the French Grand Prix. Chassis 57551 was delivered new to Strasbourg mill owner Jean Levy, hidden on a Dordogne farm through WWII, then owned by painter Andre Derain, Harrah's Automobile Collection and Genentech co-founder Herbert Boyer. Harrah's added the supercharger for full 57SC spec and took Best of Show at Pebble Beach in 1976; after a second restoration it won Most Elegant Closed Car there in 2014. It now leaves the Jim Patterson Collection after 25 years.

Prewar Bugattis with double Pebble Beach honors and unbroken provenance almost never trade publicly — this is the reference-grade 57S Atalante against which the market will reprice the model.

Read the original at RM Sotheby's →

Hennessey reveals the Blackbird: a $2.5 million touring machine limited to 71 units. An all-new Ilmor-developed 6.2-litre naturally aspirated V8 targets 800-850 hp past 9,000 rpm, paired only with a 6-speed gated manual and rear-wheel drive. Targets: 0-60 in 2.5 seconds, 220 mph, under 1,360 kg dry.

Announced August 3 and debuting at The Quail on August 14, the Blackbird is Hennessey's third original car after Venom GT and Venom F5, with over two thirds of the run already allocated. The name honors the Lockheed SR-71: vertical rear stabilizers deploy at 71 mph and pivot 71 degrees. The cabin is deliberately analog - zero screens, a physical ignition key, exposed shift linkage and a dash-mounted whiskey compass; CarPlay lives on your phone in a holster. Built on a bespoke carbon tub in Sealy, Texas, with gullwing doors and a front trunk for two carry-ons, it is engineered to cover 800-mile days. Customer production is targeted for 2029-2030 as Venom F5 output winds down.

While the industry hybridizes, Texas builds the anti-hypercar: the most powerful naturally aspirated road-car V8 ever, three pedals, no pixels.

Read the original at Hennessey →

The only competition-built Talbot-Lago Teardrop in existence heads to RM Sotheby's Monterey, August 13-15, estimated at $7-8 million. Chassis 90117 is one of just 11 New York-style Teardrop coupes by Figoni et Falaschi - and the sole example that raced, holding 9th at Le Mans 1939 before retiring after 88 laps.

Commissioned by French racer Philippe Regnier de Massa on the short competition chassis with the 4.0-litre straight-six and Wilson pre-selector gearbox, 90117 got a lower, longer body, long-range tank, bucket seat, a 250 km/h speedometer - and a heart-shaped sunroof. After the war it vanished behind the Iron Curtain near Berlin and was only rediscovered after German reunification, then restored over six years from 1996. Under collector Oscar Davis it won awards at Villa d'Este 2010 and the Louis Vuitton Classic 2011, and sold for $7,265,000 at Monterey in 2022. Figoni's Teardrop design, unveiled at the 1937 Paris Motor Show, is considered the pinnacle of French Art Deco coachbuilding.

Pre-war French curves with a real Le Mans story - the kind of car that wins Best of Show, not just auctions.

Read the original at Sports Car Digest →

Brabus revealed the Bodo, its first ground-up supercar after 49 years as a tuner. A hand-built 5.2-litre biturbo V12 makes 1,000 hp and 1,200 Nm, good for 0-100 in 3.0 seconds and 360 km/h. 77 cars, from roughly EUR 1.2 million, half already sold.

The Bodo is a 2+2 Gran Turismo bodied entirely in exposed carbon fibre on an Aston Martin Vanquish chassis, whose twin-turbo V12 Brabus re-engineers for about 20 percent more power than the donor car. Peak torque arrives between 2,900 and 5,000 rpm and runs through an eight-speed automatic to the rear axle via an electronically controlled limited-slip diff. Production is capped at 77 units, a nod to the company's 1977 founding, with annual output of only 10 to 15 cars. The name honours late founder Bodo Buschmann, who left an unfinished large-coupe project when he died eight years ago. His son Constantin now runs the company.

A tuner of Mercedes, Rolls-Royce and Porsche for five decades has just become a manufacturer. That is a bigger jump than the spec sheet suggests.

Read the original at Brabus →

Gooding & Christie's offers 1963 Ferrari 250 P chassis 0810 at Pebble Beach on 15 August, estimated at $15-20 million. It is the original mid-engine V12 prototype that started Ferrari's entire P-series bloodline.

Chassis 0810 debuted at Monza in March 1963, finished second overall at the 12 Hours of Sebring and third overall at Le Mans that June, driven by works men Mairesse, Bandini, Vaccarella, Parkes and Maglioli. Released to Luigi Chinetti's N.A.R.T. for 1964, it won the Canadian GP at Mosport with Pedro Rodriguez and took two class wins at Bahamas Speed Week. It has been in the same collection since 1988, documented by Ferrari historian Marcel Massini, and still carries its original Tipo 128 LM 63 engine and 564/D transaxle. Every mid-engine V12 Ferrari since, from the 275 P to the 330 P4, 512 S and 333 SP, traces back to this car.

It headlines the Gooding & Christie's Pebble Beach sale on 14-15 August, the most watched auction weekend of the collector year.

Read the original at Gooding & Christie's →

Q by Aston Martin built a Vanquish 25 to mark 25 years of the nameplate: 25 coupes, 25 Volantes, all in Q Skye Silver.

The 5.2-litre twin-turbo V12 is untouched at 824 hp and 1,000 Nm, driving the rear wheels through an eight-speed automatic. 0-100 km/h takes 3.3 seconds, top speed is 344 km/h. Q adds metal foil inlays on the sills and shield vanes, stainless steel side strakes, reworked exhaust finishers, 21-inch forged wheels with a V motif, laser-etched cabin trim and embroidered headrests. Buyers choose two seats or 2+2.

Skye Silver is a direct nod to the 2001 Geneva show car. Public debut falls in Monterey Car Week, 10-16 August, with customer deliveries from Q4 2026. Aston has not published pricing; reported US quotes sit around 596,300 dollars for the coupe and 634,700 for the Volante.

Read the original at Forbes →

A 1985 Ferrari 288 GTO with 1,541 km on the clock goes to RM Sotheby's in Monterey on 15 August, estimated at 9 to 11 million dollars.

Chassis 54789 is the 99th production 288 GTO. It was delivered to Germany but never collected by first owner Hans Breidenbroich, stored at Auto-Becker in Dusseldorf, then sat 20 years in Eckhard Bluhm's Cologne collection next to an F40, F50 and Enzo. Ferrari Classiche certified the car in February 2026 with matching-numbers engine and gearbox. RM believes six or fewer documented sub-1,000-mile 288 GTOs remain.

Fewer than 300 288 GTOs were built. The 2.8-litre twin-turbo V8 made 400 hp and 189 mph, the fastest road car of its day, and the model is where the Ferrari hypercar line begins. If it clears 11 million it resets the ceiling and confirms untouched 1980s halo cars now trade alongside 1960s racing Ferraris.

Read the original at RM Sotheby's →

Rezvani teases the Beast X: a custom 6.2-liter V8 with forged internals, 1,560 hp, all-wheel drive, carbon body. Claimed 0-60 mph in 1.9 seconds. Just five units worldwide — full reveal August 10 at Monterey.

The Beast X is the wildest evolution of Rezvani's Corvette-based Beast line — the standard car is a $485,000, 1,000 hp twin-turbo build on the C8. Confirmed AWD points to the E-Ray platform with its front motor reworked for double the factory output. Teasers show a ventilated hood, canards, roof scoop and a wingless tail with full-width light bar over a transparent engine cover. Deposits are open at $1,500; final pricing lands at the reveal, head-to-head with Europe's biggest hypercar debuts.

Five cars and 1,560 hp is America's answer to the European boutique hypercar wave the Alpine scene knows from Villa d'Este.

Read the original at Carscoops →

RM Sotheby's offers a 1962 Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato at Monterey on August 15, estimated at $12-15 million. It is the 14th of only 19 ever built — rarer than the Ferrari 250 GT SWB it was designed to beat — with matching-numbers 314 hp twin-plug straight-six.

Chassis 0186/R is the only DB4 GT Zagato sold new to Australia, delivered in December 1961. It won the 1962 South Pacific GT Championship at Longford, hitting 145 mph in period, before rule changes ended its racing career with body and engine intact. After a bare-metal restoration in Sanction II Works Green it won its class at the 2019 Pebble Beach Concours and was a Best of Show finalist. It runs as Lot 338 in RM's largest-ever Monterey sale — 193 lots, in a week Hagerty forecasts at roughly $470M total.

With 19 built against 167 Ferrari 250 SWBs, this is the blue-chip Aston — a live test of the top end of the market.

Read the original at RM Sotheby's →