This is your new home for all things automotive, delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday. Assembled by Alistair and the team at The Next Drive, you can expect deep-dives into the latest models, news insights, reader columns, second-hand car spotlights, curated deals and much more as we go! Get a taster for what’s to come below in this, our first ever edition, and let us know what you’d like to see more of. But for now, happy reading!

With its new Valhalla supercar, Aston Martin has truly set its sights on beating Ferrari and McLaren at their own game.

I headed out to northern Spain last month to try the long-awaited Valhalla for myself, both on the fabulous Navarra race track and local roads. Arriving at the circuit by helicopter, it was the sort of launch that puts you right into the shoes of the customers Aston Martin hopes will buy the £850,000 Valhalla.

A thousand-horsepower hybrid supercar (perhaps even a hypercar?), the Valhalla combines a mid-mounted, turbo-charged V8 engine with three electric motors – one between the engine and gearbox, plus two more on the front axle. This gives the car huge, all-wheel-drive traction, and since the front motors perform all sorts of torque-vectoring witchcraft through every corner, it flatters its driver. Despite the looks and power on offer – and the F1-style seating position, ankles raised to hip height – the Valhalla is perfectly approachable on road and track.

Comfortable, too. I was amazed at how well it rode across broken road surfaces, its active suspension soaking up the bumps and barely a shudder passing through the stiff carbon tub.

It even acts as a plug-in – Aston’s first, in fact – and can manage about nine miles of electric driving, should you not wish to wake the neighbours on an early-morning drive.

Add everything together, and the Valhalla is a serious sign of intent. It is proof that Aston Martin is more than capable of taking on Ferrari, McLaren and Lamborghini at the very top of the supercar league. It’s also something of a bargain, squaring up directly to the £3m Ferrari F80 and £2m McLaren W1. All that’s missing is a better soundtrack from its titanium exhaust and a boot. Send your luggage in ahead, and the Valhalla is a hypercar you’ll want to use every day. Check out my full review video here!

That’s Hyundai’s new imagery for their ‘Earth’ concept. Accompanied by a suitably vague video of a meteor crashing into Mars(?), we’re not entirely sure what to make of it. Anyone else getting Jaguar rebrand vibes?

Multiple reports came out this week of second-hand EV dealers across Europe seeing record EV sales. The cause is obvious with fuel price uncertainty being as it is, but the speed of this reflex is still quite surprising.

It comes as a significant boost to the already growing trend in the used car market of declining diesel/petrol sales. Some dealers now report that used EVs are at price parity with petrol alternatives which should help to nudge the market along with more sustainable growth. If you’re looking to sell, now looks like a good time!

Anyone taking this one on?! Over here in the UK, there aren’t many Skylarks about, so even though this one has done 300,000 miles (yes, you read that right) and needs a lot of work, it might still fetch a pretty penny.

We don’t just want to talk at you in this newsletter, we want you to be a part of it too! Each week we’ll be featuring a readers’ vehicle with a bit of background info and why it matters to them. It could be your reliable daily drive that gets you from A to B without any fuss, a project you’re working on or a pile of rust you have sitting in your garage.

If you’d like to be featured, get in touch at [email protected]!

The Brussels Grand Prix was held at Heizel. Run in three heats of 22 laps each, the race was won by Australian driver Jack Brabham in a Cooper T53 after all of the times were aggregated.

In case you missed it, this our latest video on The Next Drive, featuring a proper track day and everyday life test!

Thanks for reading The Next Drive this week! We’re just getting started so stick around to see what we’ve got coming up.

Until next week,

Alistair