Aston Martin entering WEC Hypercar, IMSA GTP fields with Valkyrie LMH
Aston Martin is set to return to the top class of sportscar racing as a factory, with today’s announcement at AMR Technology Campus in the UK that the Valkyrie LMH program has been revived.
At least one Valkyrie, entered by Aston Martin, will compete in the FIA WEC Hypercar and IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP class from 2025 onwards. This two-pronged approach means Aston Martin becomes the first manufacturer to commit an LMH-spec car to both championships.
This revitalised program, which was initially announced at Le Mans in 2019 and shelved in early 2020, and which RACER has teased since June, will receive support and backing from The Heart of Racing, a current Aston Martin customer team which currently competes in the GT ranks of both the WEC and IMSA.
“Performance is the lifeblood of everything that we do at Aston Martin, and motorsport is the ultimate expression of this pursuit of excellence,” said Lawrence Stroll, the executive chairman of Aston Martin Lagonda.
“We have been present at Le Mans since the earliest days, and through those glorious endeavors we succeeded in winning Le Mans in 1959 and our class 19 times over the past 95 years. Now we return to the scene of those first triumphs aiming to write new history with a racing prototype inspired by the fastest production car Aston Martin has ever built.
“In addition to our presence in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship, Aston Martin’s return to the pinnacle of endurance racing will allow us to build a deeper connection with our customers and community, many of whom found their passion for the brand through our past success at Le Mans. And of course, the complex knowledge base we are building through our F1 team is data that Aston Martin Performance Technologies can harness to further enhance the capabilities of the Valkyrie race car at Le Mans, in WEC and IMSA.
“Just as the learnings we gain through endurance competition will feed directly into our road car programs, further improving the ultimate performance of our products. I would like to thank Gabe Newell and Heart of Racing for partnering with Aston Martin on this program, and I look forward to working with him and the team as we aim for success in the greatest endurance race of them all.”
To prepare the Valkyrie for competition, staff at the AMR Technology Campus, have started work on developing a competition prototype version of the car.
In order for it to compete against other LMH and LMDh cars around the world, the Valkyrie must fit within the predefined aerodynamic and power performance window in the regulations.
The race-optimized carbon-fiber chassis Valkyrie will use a modified version of the Cosworth-built 6.5-litre naturally aspirated V12 engine, which in standard form revs to 11,000rpm and develops over 1000bhp.
The power unit will be enhanced further to incorporate the critical Balance of Performance requirements of the Hypercar class, and developed to withstand the rigors of top level long-distance competition. It is set to be a significantly different unit to the original power unit planned when the program was originally revealed back in 2019.
As with the Valkyrie AMR Pro track-car, the battery-electric hybrid system that features on the road-specification Valkyrie is absent from the race car.
As with the Valkyrie AMR Pro track-car, the battery-electric hybrid system that features on the road-specification Valkyrie is absent from the race car.
That decision means Aston Martin is set to be the only major OEM competing in Hypercar and GTP with a non-hybrid prototype. It will also be the only marque competing with a race car based on an existing production car.
Once homologated, The Heart of Racing team, founded in 2014 by American businessman and philanthropist Gabe Newell, will spearhead Aston Martin’s programs in both WEC and IMSA.
The Heart of Racing is a charity that raises money for the Seattle Children’s Cardiology Research Fund and has an association with Aston Martin dating back to 2020. Since then its race team has competed predominantly with the Vantage GT3 in IMSA’s GTD classes.
The team also made its 24 Hours of Le Mans debut with the Aston Martin Vantage GTE in June this year, finishing seventh, as part of its current WEC GTE Am effort under the Northwest AMR banner.
“It’s a privilege to be able to bring Aston Martin back to the top of endurance racing with the Heart of Racing,” said Ian James, the team principal of Heart of Racing.
“Our team has grown exponentially since we began racing with those famous wings at Daytona in 2020. We understand and are aligned with the ethos of the brand and we have developed our own systems and technologies to extract the maximum performance of the cars we compete with. Our understanding of Valkyrie is strong and we have worked closely with it through our customer activation programs for two years now.
“This HoR team has big ambitions in endurance racing and this is absolutely the right time for us to step into the top classes of WEC and IMSA and challenge for overall honors. This is not an easy target, but between our partners and the support of Aston Martin Performance Technologies, it is one we have all the tools and capabilities in place to hit the bullseye with.”
In addition to the announcement today that Aston Martin will return to the top class of international sportscar racing with the Valkyrie, it also confirmed its plans for GT racing going forward.
In 2024 Aston Martin will debut a brand new GT3 and GT4 Vantage, which is already out testing and is expected to compete globally next season, to help ensure Aston Martin has a customer GT presence in the FIA WEC, IMSA and in SRO’s World Challenge series going forward.
There is no imagery available of the new Vantage GT3 or GT4 as of yet, though RACER has been told that rather than being a mild refresh, both look substantially different to the current race cars.
The new cars will bring the curtain down on the current Vantage platform in GTE, GT3 and GT4 competition, which has amassed significant races wins and titles around the world.
This means that from 2025 onwards, Aston Martin will have a significant presence in Formula 1, Hypercar, GT3 and GT4 competition.
“Today marks the beginning of a new chapter for Aston Martin in endurance racing. As a manufacturer, Aston Martin has a consistent record of success at world championship level and, through the efforts of the Heart of Racing, also now in IMSA,” Adam Carter, the new head of endurance motorsport at Aston Martin said.
“Valkyrie takes us back into the top tier of sportscar racing and, together with our partners we are absolutely confident that we can deliver a race car with the potential and the performance capabilities to fight alongside the benchmark machinery in the class.
“To be able to do this in cooperation with a proven championship-winning operation such as Heart of Racing ensures we have all we need to race from a competitive platform. It’s a fascinating program, given that this is the only hypercar in the class with direct synergies to its road car counterpart, but the Valkyrie concept was always intended to break through boundaries, and now we have the opportunity to show what it can do on a track.
“By also confirming Aston Martin’s commitment to a new GT3 and GT4 challenger, we signal our intent to compete for victory at all levels of sportscar racing now and well into the future.”
For more information: www.racer.com
