The Aston Martin Rapide is a five-door, high-performance sport saloon, which British luxury marque Aston Martin introduced in early 2010. It was first presented as a concept car at the North American International Auto Show in 2006. The Rapide name is a reference to the Lagonda Rapide, a saloon car produced by Lagonda, now part of Aston Martin. The car is based on an Aston Martin DB9. The base price for the Aston Martin Rapide is $199,950 (USD) and the first cars were rolled out in May 2010.
The Rapide is built at a dedicated plant at the Magna Steyr facility in Graz, Austria. Production began in 2010 and the factory plans to build 2,000 per year.[4] The concept car version featured a full-length glass roof and LED light bars on the rear end, two firsts for Aston Martin. The glass roof was not carried through to production.
It is the spiritual successor to the Aston Martin Lagonda, the company's previous four-door saloon, which was discontinued in 1989 — 21 years before the Rapide's launch.
For luxury and convenience, the Rapide's standard features include a tilt-telescoping steering wheel, bi-xenon headlamps and LED taillamps. Leather and walnut trim are standard, with metallic accents; power front seats with memory, cooling and heating; Bluetooth; satellite radio (US version only); and USB and iPod connectivity. The Rapide comes, as standard, with a Bang & Olufsen 16 speaker sound system with two that rise from the dashboard on activation of the system. The production version of the Rapide was shown at the 2009 Frankfurt Motor Show.
