Some European OEM's may scoff at the thought of producing just 45 GT3 homologated cars over the 5 year racing life span of a car but thats just what Aston Martin Racing will do this year as the morph from one iteration of the Vantage chassis to the new.

Having read some articles where some German GT3 manufacturer have sold a greater number of their own platforms in just half a season, few can claim that the original chassis concept and design has remained competitive throughout its life like the AMR V12 Vantage GT3 which has remained fully race competitive since its reveal in late 2011.

We have learned that the AMR factory will be looking to cease production of the current specification GT3 Vantage at the chassis number 45, a number that should be attained by the end of the summer. Two such new chassis have already been completed and shipped to the Australasia racing environment (which have been specifically asked not to divulge to where or whom) with a further two due to be shipped to AF Racing in Europe in the coming weeks.


We then understand that the 2/3 balance to that illusive 45 car figure will then be made up of GT3 'specials' before total Prodrive factory emphasis is placed upon the new variant of Vantage racer.

Prior to Le Mans we learned that the new AMR GTE  platform is well under construction within the factory with its roll cage being fabricated and fitted alongside a power plant that much resembled a V8 block with spinney things attached!!

Our guess is that is should be out testing by the end of the summer/early autumn.

Glancing through the various streams of social media, it was obvious that those at the Goodwood Festival of Speed today (and this weekend to be exact) have had an absolute treat as Aston Martin unleashed some of their latest machinery up that infamous hill.

Using the event to launch their latest extreme track day 'weapon' in the form of the re-engineered and upgraded Vulcan AMR Pro option, the brand also went onto to showcase cars like the Vantage AMR Pro, another car never previously seen run in public till now.


The Vulcan AMR Pro upgrade package is now available to any of the owners of the 24 Vulcan cars that were produced by AML in 2016 and will allow an already monster car experience greater acceleration of the corners as well as greater aerodynamic stability - if it ever needed it.


The even more limited edition AMR Vantage Pro, one of just seven in existence also saw its first public outing today although the lane through the private estate is hardly conducive for any significant pace from any vehicle without paying a hefty price.


Those attending the four day event will also benefit from the spectacle of Aston Martin running a number of their most recent road car editions as well as runs from the #97 Aston Martin Racing Le Mans GTE Pro winning car in the hands of Jonny Adam.

Photo credits - Aston Martin / FOS

Solaris Motorsport is strongly determined to change the difficulty 2017 season, harder than expected for the Vantage GT3. The Italian team bets on the second part of the season and it has scheduled some test sessions in July and August. The declared goal is to back racing at Silverstone - fifth round of the 2017 International GT Open season - in the best shape possible, aiming to fight for the podium positions. Francesco Sini and Mauro Calamia will skip the Hungarian round scheduled this weekend in order to be ready for the next event in England.

The Solaris Motorsport Aston Martin Vantage GT3 has suffered in these first races the new compound of the tires used in the International GT Open. The results was a general lack of grip that sometimes slowed the Sini-Calamia duo during the races and the qualifying sessions. Despite some good performances enhanced by exciting comebacks, the Solaris Motorsport technicians and drivers are not completely satisfied by the results gained in the first three round of the 2017 season and, because this, they decided to sacrifice the race in Hungary and take the maximum advantage from the long summer break, testing on track new solutions for Silverstone.

Between July and August, the Italian Vantage will hit the track for some test sessions in order to find a better setup with these tires and to allow the team to gain more kilometers of experience. "We took this decision in order to be ready and competitive when the championship will restart. We will take advantage of the summer break for understand and know better these new tires and find a new setup for this compound." commented Roberto Sini. "We will be back at Silverstone with the precise goal to fight for the top positions and begin the climb back up in the standings. Unfortunately the crash of this winter ruined our plans and the close-range sequence of the races didn't allow us to solve some problems. We didn't have the time to hit the track and try new solutions. Now we have the chance to work with calm and to be back to fight for the podium as the same as last year. The second part of this 2017 season will be very different."

The FFSA European GT4 Series Southern Cup heads to Dijon with three V8 Vantage GT4's this time making the trip down for their third round of the season after their last event around the streets of Pau.
Joining the 33 car strong entry will again be the two single car full season entries from Street Art Racing and Generation AMR SuperRacing joined this time by the sister Street Art Racing car normally seen in the series parallel Northern Cup series.

In the #7 SAR car, regular driver Jerome Demay is joined this time by Frenchman Sébastien Pineau whilst the #44 Genartion AMR car of James Holder and Matt George and #117 SAR car of Eric Cayrolle and Arno Santamato remain unchanged.

This will be the second time that the series has visited this track in 2017 having used it for their official test day prior to the season.


With Round 4 of the International GT Open Championship heads for the Hungaroring this weekend, but we are surprised to see that Italian team Solaris Motorsport are missing from the provisional entry list for the event. We are awaiting confirmation of this from the team as to the reasons why.

Having inexcusably escaped our attention from last weekend, it was very pleasing to see today that the two Aston Martin entries that ran in last weekends VLN 3 meeting each earned themselves a class podium position by the end of the four hour race.

The #134 Aston Martin Vantage GT8, being ran again by the local Aston Martin Test Centre for its boss and two extremely lucky clients ended P2 within their six car SP8 class whilst the #189 Mathol Racing prepared Avia Racing V8 Vantage GT4 won their SP10 class albeit with a little 'extra' help from a certain Marc Basseng of Rowe Racing BMW GT3 note!!


Round 4 of the series is just next weekend.

Photo credits - VLN / Mathol Racing

Having not entered their Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4 into the 2017 British GT Championship after two previous seasons in the SRO series, JW Bird Motorsport are finally waving goodbye to their car by listing it for sale on the Racecardirect.com website.

Usually driven by Kieran Griffin and the 2014 British GT GT4 Champion Jake Giddings within the domestic championship, the car also saw victorious service with the team and extended driver line up at the 2015 Dubai 24H where it finished third in class.

Full details of the sale can be found HERE

Photo credit - Jacob Ebrey

Source material - Beechdean AMR