The best track day cars bring with them unrivalled handling delicacy, tactile involvement and responsiveness, plus performance that is orders of magnitude higher than the on paper power outputs would suggest.
The 4R, meanwhile, turns things up to 11. The power output swells from 320bhp to 400bhp, its Ohlins dampers with remote reservoirs are updated and mated to either special track or road/track springs and it offers Ariel's first ABS option too. Since the demise of the 1.6-litre Ford Sigma-engined 310R, the more muscular 360R is the Seven that’s the sweetest spot in the line-up. Powered by the larger and more raucous 180 bhp 2.0-litre, it's a lightning quick and responsive performer, intake roar and exhaust bark adding to the heady sense of a near bottomless pit of on road performance.
Under carbon fibre bodywork that takes its cues from Sixties Can Am racers, the Spartan features a bespoke spaceframe chassis, double wishbone suspension and a turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder Honda engine mounted amidships. Crucially, it’s also a riot to drive, and like the best lightweights you don’t have to be driving like you’re fleeing an erupting volcano.
It’s at its best when driven within its limits on typically twisty British back roads, where you quickly get drawn into the sights, sounds and smells of a bygone motor era. There’s also incredible ride quality here to match amazing long-travel body control, and what little there is of the Nomad is beautifully constructed.
Better still is the handling, with communicative unassisted steering and a supple suspension set-up that allows the poised and adjustable Vertige breathe with the road surface. Although the skeletal Mono R looks similar to its Mono predecessor, BAC bosses, the Briggs brothers, claim it’s 90 percent new and even lighter at 555kg.
That said, it comes at a considerable price, the R costing nearly £200,000 before options Even so, the limited production run of 30 is reportedly already sold out.If it is authenticity you crave, then names don’t come more ‘motorsport’ than that of Italian outfit Dallara.