Countdown to WEC at Silverstone

The waiting is almost over and the start of the 2015 World Endurance Championship will soon be upon  us as the opening race kicks off at Silverstone in just six days time.

Since the final race of 2014 in Brazil many personnel changes have been made within the Aston Martin Racing family - drivers have come, drivers have gone as well as squad names and sponsors. The upshot of it all is that we will be left with five V8 Vantage GTE's having full season WEC entry status, a net rise of one car compared to last year and evenly spread over the GTE Pro (3 cars) and GTE Am (2 cars) classifications.

Other changes involve the Young Driver AMR squad moving up to GTE Pro with a slight change in driver line up with Kristian Poulsen (see Massive Motorsports ELMS story) being replaced with Marco Sorenson and Christoffer Nygaard returning to the team after a year away with its then sister car. Nikki Thiim completes the #95 car driver line up.


Another realignment is that last years partner team Craft Bamboo have elected to take a sabbatical from this years WEC having had something of a steep learning curve last year. As a result the #99 cars driver line up is retain by Aston Martin Racing but will change slightly - they retain the driving services of Fernando Rees and Alex MacDowall but this year will obtain the talents of last years 'super sub' Richie Stanaway.

The #99 car will also retain the beautiful blue and yellow Valero livery for at least part of the season.


Completing the GTE Pro entry is the most successful AMR driver line that there has been to date in Darren Turner and Stefan Mucke. The most notable change in their #97 car entry will be its livery and sponsor detail with the car dropping the more traditional Gulf livery in favour of a new red an yellow livery of the teams technical partner Hanergy.


Over in the GTE Am class we see the return of the #98 car and the 2014 GTE Am runners up of Paul Dalla Lana and Pedro Lamy joined this year by Mathias Lauda. Although a new driver line up for 2015 the squad have been able to get decent mileage under their belts from their 2015 TUSCC entry which features as an additional commitment to their WEC entry. That provision has also allowed the likes of Turner and Mucke to gain precious GTE pre season mileage.

Joining them in GTE Am for the 2015 season will be the Gulf Racing Vantage GTE of Roald Goethe, Stuart Hall and Aston Martin new comer Francessco Castellacci. Having spent last year competing in the European Le Mans Series and missing out on the 24Hr of Le Mans this car and driver line up will have a rapturous return. 



Obviously, the #96 Gulf Racing car shall retain its Gulf Racing livery although you will be now have noticed that it has evolved slightly from last year!!

Photo Credits - Aston Martin Racing