Aston Martin has been quite successful in the world of motorsport. The British automaker has been pushing its cars on the racetrack since the 1950s. In recent years, Aston Martin Racing has had strong results running in various GT endurance races around the globe, with a notable first-in-class finish at the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans. Now though, the aging Vantage road car has been replaced, and with the new version comes a new racing variant, the Vantage GTE.
We saw the Vantage GTE when Aston Martin unveiled it last week. Now we see behind the scenes of its development and testing in a video produced by the company.
Developed along with the road car, the Vantage GTE has been pushed through many hours and miles of vigorous testing. This includes running cars in 30-hour endurance tests to see what might break, how it might break, and what the teams can do to stop it from breaking.
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The Vantage GTE is going to have a lot of help ensuring that it finishes near the front of the pack. Aston Martin has teamed up with the likes of Öhlins, Alcon, and Michelin. That means the suspension, brakes, and tires are all sorted out for best performance. All of the goodies supplied by those manufacturers are bolted to the aluminum chassis of the Vantage GTE, which is stiffer than the chassis of the outgoing car and further buttoned up with a steel roll cage.
Aston Martin boss Andy Palmer says the road car and the racing car give and take from each other. It's important that both cars were developed at the same time, so the knowledge from one can be used to make the other better. The prior Vantage race car, however, started life as a road car and nothing more, then was developed throughout its life. This time around, Aston Martin knew that to win races it should focus its efforts right from the outset on Vantage road car and race car development.
So how will the new car fare on the track? You can see for yourself when it makes its motorsport debut in May for the 6 Hours of Spa race in Belgium.
