Having Qualified an extremely close third on the grid for the start of Saturday's Intercontinental GT Challenge California 8 Hours of Laguna Seca, Florida based Automatic Racing and their V8 Vantage GT4 were looking to avenge the memory that was their last outing at the event last year which ended after just lap 3.

#The sveltely liveried #22 Stoner Car Care was started by team regular Charles Espenlaub, who although having dropped back to P6 in the initial laps soon recovered to run and contest for P2 in the GT4 class just behind the then class leading Ginetta and all was soon looking comfortable for the team with a car that looked extremely quick on the straights.


Disaster for the team was to strike however at the end of the first hour mark when the car suddenly slowed before stopping just before the infamous 'corkscrew' at the back of the circuit with the lack of fuel being cited as the cause. Loosing valuable time and laps to their class rivals, the corner workers were at least able to use the downward slope of the corkscrew to get the car back into pit lane under its own momentum but by the time that Charlie Pittman had got in, refuelled and left he was already three laps down.

"Pretty unbelievable and frustrating' was the quote from the cars third driver Eric Lux at the time.

Despite putting their heads down and piling in the laps the #22 car was later to receive a severe time sanction form Race Control for an 'unquantified' transgression that lost them a further seven and a half minutes whilst it was dealt with - basically destroying any remaining possibility of a decent finish in the process.


The final 'icing on the cake' came with just under an hour remaining when an electrical gremlin put the car out of the race and ended the team's somewhat mixed season on something of a downer.

Photo credits - SRO

Three of Aston Martin Racing’s most valued partner teams will have the opportunity to race the new Aston Martin Vantage GT3 for the first time when they participate in the Gulf 12 Hours event at the Yas Marina Circuit, in Abu Dhabi, on December 15.

Oman Racing with TF Sport spearheads the Aston Martin challenge in the PRO class, having finished third overall in the event in 2015, and second in the PRO/AM class last year. The team features two works drivers; three-time Le Mans class winner Darren Turner (GB) and team regular Jonny Adam (GB) in its line-up alongside Ahmad Al Harthy (OM).

TF Sport, which campaigns an Aston Martin V8 Vantage GTE in the FIA World Endurance Championship and ran V12 Vantage GT3s in the 2018 Blancpain Endurance Series and British GT Championships, has already confirmed it will race the new Vantage GT3 in the UK next year.

Alongside TF Sport in the PRO class will be R-Motorsport, a winner and record three-time consecutive pole setter on its debut season in the Blancpain Endurance Series with the V12 Vantage GT3 and a loyal long-time campaigner of Aston Martin racing cars. This entry will be a contender for victory on its race debut and will run with regular drivers Jake Dennis (GB) and Marvin Kirchhöfer (GER). A third driver is yet to be confirmed.

In the PRO AM class and another team making its race debut is Beechdean AMR, running a Vantage GT3 for two-time British GT and European Le Mans Series champion Andrew Howard (GB), Humaid al Masaood (UAE), Chris Dyson (USA) and works driver Ross Gunn (GB).

TF Sport team principal Tom Ferrier said: “It’s an honour to be among the first customers to race the new Aston Martin Vantage GT3, a car for which we have high hopes. We’ve already committed to racing it in the British GT Championship in 2019 and we’re excited to find out what the car is capable of in competitive conditions in the Gulf 12 Hours.”

Beechdean AMR team owner Andrew Howard said: “Having been the first team to run the outgoing multiple race and championship winning Vantage, it is a real privilege to be part of a line-up with the first AM drivers to race the new Vantage GT3. We have been lucky enough to test the prototype and if that is anything to go by, then it will be as big a leap from the current car as the Vantage was from the glorious DBRS9. Another great step forward by Aston Martin.”

R-Motorsport team principal Florian Kamelger said: “We are really excited to run the new Aston Martin Vantage GT3 on its debut outing outside Europe. The challenging event in Abu Dhabi will give us the best opportunity to test the car in a long-distance race before we run it in 2019.”

Aston Martin Racing President David King said: “Handing the keys of the new Vantage GT3s to our top partner teams to race in Abu Dhabi is the next critical step in the car’s development ahead of its planned homologation early next year. The Vantage GT3 has performed exceptionally well in its test and development programme to date and proved highly competitive on its Nürburgring Nordschleife debut in October. Primarily a car built for top level customers to race, we’re confident it will be a potent force in the Gulf 12 Hours and the feedback from our partner teams will no doubt be invaluable in refining the car prior to wider customer team supply next year.”

The eighth edition of the Gulf 12 Hours, which comprises two six-hour races, takes place on 15 December from 0900 local time.


Source material - Aston Martin Racing

With racing duties within the new Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3 so far being restricted to factory drivers, that will all change in mid December when three examples of the new 2019 turbo charged Vantage GT3 race in the colours of the Oman Racing Team by TF Sport, Beechdean AMR and R-Motorsport at the 2018 Gulf 12Hrs event in Abu Dhabi.

Both Oman Racing and Beechdean AMR cement their continued and long established association with the Aston Martin Racing brand into the next generation of race car as well as relative new comer R-Motorosport who have become more of a strategic partner for both the race side and production car side of Aston Martin than just a race team.

Oman Racing will enter their car into the Pro class with Ahmad Al Harthy being joined this year by AMR factory drivers Jonny Adam and Darren Turner as will R-Motorsport who have today announced just Jake Dennis and Marvin Kirchhofer for that entry. Stepping outside of his prior experience and comfort zone is Andrew Howard who will race again alongside AMR reserve and former ELMS co driver Ross Gunn as well as local driver Humaid al Masaood in the Pro Am class.

To date, the new AMR V8 Vantage GT3 has only seen competitive track action at Le Mans and more latterly at the penultimate round of the VLN Series from the Nordschleife where drivers Turner and Maxime Martin so nearly upset the 'apple cart' with such a strong performance to finish fourth overall and despite pit stop penalties being applied through the race due to the cars current non-homologated state.

We understand that no Customer Team has yet to receive any of their orders for 2019 specification Vantages as testing and development continues apace even this week with a 30hour continuous test at Paul Ricard so when these teams get to see their new cars before being require to ship out to the Middle East we don't know.

“It will be a privilege to pair up with Darren and Jonny once again, who are both amazing factory drivers. Yas Marina is close to Oman, so is obviously a true local race for Oman Racing and we’re looking forward to the incredible support I know we’ll receive from all of our guests and amazing sponsors who will be there to cheer us on. I can’t wait to be back in Abu Dhabi” said Al Harthy.

 He added: “I’d like to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to everyone who is making this possible, it’s big news and a great honour for Oman Racing to be running the brand new Aston Martin GT3 in the Gulf 12 Hours. Hopefully, we’ll all have something to celebrate!”

Beechdean AMR team owner Andrew Howard said: “Having been the first team to run the outgoing multiple race and championship winning Vantage, it is a real privilege to be part of a line-up with the first AM drivers to race the new Vantage GT3. We have been lucky enough to test the prototype and if that is anything to go by, then it will be as big a leap from the current car as the Vantage was from the glorious DBRS9. Another great step forward by Aston Martin.”
Aston Martin Racing President David King said: “Handing the keys of the new Vantage GT3s to our top partner teams to race in Abu Dhabi is the next critical step in the car’s development ahead of its planned homologation early next year. The Vantage GT3 has performed exceptionally well in its test and development programme to date and proved highly competitive on its Nürburgring Nordschleife debut in October. Primarily a car built for top level customers to race, we’re confident it will be a potent force in the Gulf 12 Hours and the feedback from our partner teams will no doubt be invaluable in refining the car prior to wider customer team supply next year.”

A few months ago, the annual trip to the Circuit of the Americas for the Creventic 24H Series appeared to include at least five Aston Martin Racing cars split between the GT3 and GT4 classes.

Todays glance at the Entry List appears to now only include a single GT3 entry from the Swiss based R-Motorsport team with the others having dropped out over time.

The other expected GT3 entry from De La Torre Motorsport has been confirmed to us not to be in attendance with the team's V12 Vantage GT3 even being put up for sale in Florida in readiness for a future acquisition from the UK! Also, the two Automatic Racing and Speedworks Motorsport V8 Vantage GT4's have all now been removed presumably by reason of not being able to strike a commercially viable plan in time for the event.

For the event that starts in just over two weeks time, at least R-Motorsport have announced their full driver line up of Andreas Baenziger, Florian Kamelger, Peter Leemhuis and Pro driver Marvin Kirchhofer.

Photo credit - R-Motorsport

Hot on the heels of announcing that Mark Farmer will be back in the British GT Championship paddock with TF Sport with a new 2019 specification Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3 came todays announcement that the team's new for 2019 AMR Vantage GT4 will also be in attendance with a young driver taking a developmental step up the GT ladder to compete the the BGT Silver Cup.

Having competed and finishing fifth overall in the Ginetta GT5 Championship, racing as part of the British GT support programme todays announcement sees Yorkshire based Alex Toth-Jones take a leap of faith into not just a new team that he has seen operate many times in the paddock but also in a car that he nor nobody else (customer wise) has driven yet and is still under development.


Those of us at the final round of the British GT at Donington in September would have been blind to miss the fan interaction that he and his sponsors put into the finale with a sea of orange as well as his own presence in the TF Sport garage during the GT race!

This announcement sees the next step for Toth-Jones as he looks to realise his ultimate ambition of competing at Le Mans but also sees TF Sport return to the GT4 Class for the first time since Tom Ferrier's debut season in 2014.
“The British GT Championship is where I and my sponsors want to be next year,” he explained. “From Silverstone onwards we were speaking with teams and looking at who would be best to run with. After careful consideration over summer and weighing up all options with some of the top teams in British GT, we have made the decision to go with the best overall package and stepping stone to the Le Mans dream with TF Sport. I was always interested in racing the new Aston Martin GT4 car and so when the opportunity arose TF made the cut as they are the biggest AMR customer team in the world.

With useable track time fast running out in Europe a number of the Aston Martin Racing contingent have made their way down to the Paul Ricard circuit in southern France to help finalise the development of the factory's 2019 V8 Vantage GT3 and GT4 platforms.

Since the GT3's inaugural outing at the Aston Martin Racing Festival at Le Mans in June the team have been busy conducting numerous developmental and customer tests around Europe to finalise the cars development in readiness for (a) delivery to its customer teams in time for pre-season testing in early 2019 and (b) its final homologation process in early March 2019.


This weekend we see that drivers (but not limited to) Ross Gunn, Jonny Adam, Alex Lynn, Darren Turner, Marco Sorensen and Nicki Thiim have all made the trip down to the circuit in readiness for what has been labelled as a thirty hour continuous test. We could also assume that other drivers with strong AMR links will be in attendance as well.

With there still being a further three weeks until the final round of 2018 for the World Endurance Championship in Shanghai, China this event will at least allow their attending WEC driver contingent to stay race car active.

Its been a good progressive start to the proceedings so far for the Florida based Automatic Racing team as they try their luck once again at the 2018 Intercontinental GT Challenge event from the Weathertech Raceway Laguna Seca in California this weekend.

With the team's #22 Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4 again fielding the same trio of drivers as last year - Charles Espenlaub, Charlie Pittman and Eric Lux, all will be hoping to banish the demons of last year that saw the Stoner Car Care exiting the eight hour race on only the third lap.


Yesterday Free Practice and Pre-Qualifying has seen the team maintain a steady to progressive set of lap times to move into todays three way Qualifying session with good form. With each driver having up to 15 minutes of track time each but all using the same set of Pirelli control tyre it wasn't surprising to see everyones lap times drop off to form a collective time that would then be averaged out between the three drivers.

Espenlaub was the quickest of the three thanks to the fresh rubber but their collective time was just 0.033 of a second off to miss out on a front row start in the GT4 class in tomorrows race - instead they shall start behind the #51 Panoz Avezzano in P1 and the Murillo Racing Mercedes in P2.

Like any endurance race - eight hours is a long time at any circuit!

Good luck to the team.

Photo credits - Intercontinental GT Challenge

An interesting new concept from Aston Martin was launched under the autumnal sunshine of  Donington Park this morning as existing and potential customers (?) were allowed the opportunity of taking one or two of the marque's sleekest new cars around a race track without incurring the attention of any local Constabulary!

Being labelled as the Aston Martin AMR Track Day Project by company CEO Andy Palmer, this first event of an indicated many allowed a lucky few to put various cars through their paces around the circuit - maybe just to satisfy the inquisitive within or even to persuade them to take on any ambition of a motor racing future whilst having the attention of a select bunch of professional racers on hand.


Whilst we saw (from an unfortunate distance) that the likes of Darren Turner, Jamie Chadwick and Charlie Eastwood were there - in true Aston Martin style - the event was indeed a little more than just a handful of new production cars being on hand as the paddock was obviously extended either way through the company's annuals from a DBR1 right through to a modern day Vulcan!






It would be good to learn more about this project and indeed see more of the cars on track!

Photo credits - Aston Martin / Donington Pk

A few weeks ago now we learned from George Miedecke that the family run team had received and accepted two offers for their entire Aston Martin Racing fleet as they looked to switch from GT racing into the Australian TA2 Series.

Selling both V12 Vanatge GT3 cars to a team in Europe and their GT4 to a national track day club, todays announcement from the team formally puts an end to their association with the AMR brand after a couple of season in the Australian GT Championship in both GT3 and GT4.


Indeed, the teams parting contribution to the Australian GT scene was their introduction and driver coaching for GT convertee Jeremy Gary in the car that he would later go on to take a commanding Championship win in the Australian GT GT4 Championship (with the help of Andrew Miedecke in the Endurance events).

With the costs of top flight GT3 racing forever increasing it is probably fair to say that the TA2 Series reflects a more cost effective form of racing for the father/son lead team. "We are racers first and foremost" said George Miedecke. "Whilst we loved GT racing, my PRO3 status meant that I could never race on my own" he added.


We wish them all the best!

With those of us in Northern Europe, this weekend shall see that dreaded point in the calendar where we loose summer time and face the reality of longer nights, lower temperatures and traditionally many months without any racing to look forward to!

Fortunately, with after many traditional series and championships around the world having already completed their races for 2018, the growth of motor racing around the world has allowed for some bespoke events to crop up and embed themselves into a now almost continual diary of racing action for as long as we are prepared to stay up late to watch it that is!


This weekend sees the return of the Intercontinental GT Challenge from the Laguna Seca Raceway in California for the second running of the SRO sanctioned California 8 Hours event.

Returning for their second stab at the event is Florida based team, Automatic Racing who return with their #99 Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4 with a three driver line up of Charles Espenlaub, Charlie Puttman and Eric Lux who will all be hoping to avenge their fate of last year when they crashed out on just the third lap.


Continuing the SRO theme, the end of November sees the Bahrain GT Festival, a new event that incorporates three events for both GT3, GT4 and Classic cars over the weekend of 30th November to 1st December.

No entry list is yet available for these races but we know at least one Aston Martin should be present in the paddock..


Before that in mid November, the Creventic 24H Series move across the Atlantic again for their second visit to the Circuit of the Americas and another one of their infamous 24 hour races.

Having first sampled the series in Barcelona earlier this year, Swiss based R-Motorsport return with one of their V12 Vantage GT3's with team bosses Andreas Baenziger and Florian Kamelger already confirmed as being half of their driver line up.

Unfortunately, another AMR V12 Vantage GT3 due to be at the event won't be with the team boss citing prior business engagements as the cause.

The UK based Speedworks team are still due to return with their AMR V8 Vantage GT4 as well as were two GT4 cars from Automatic Racing but the latter do seem to have disappeared from the entry list already!


The Asian Le Mans Series is a new one for us AMR fans as Red River Sport take one of TF Sports V12 Vantage GT3's over to Asia for the four round series over the European winter. Drivers Johnny Mowlem, Bonney Brimes and Ivor Dunbar look to take their next steps in the ACO family of events as they look to progress to Le Mans in the next year or so and have wisely selected the V12 Vantage as their weapon of choice!


The Gulf 12hrs takes us towards Christmas with their annual event in Abu Dhabi over the 13-15th December. Again, no entry list has been published but we believe there to be at least one (maybe two) Aston Martins should be there again this year.

Then over the New Year and into 2019 of course brings us both the opening round of the new IMSA season from Daytona with their 24hour event closely followed by the 12 Hours of Bathurst which is now part of the Intercontinental GT Challenge series. With just ninety or so days left to Daytona, we are hoping for some kind of announcement from Aston Martin Racing as to whether or not they have found anyone to run a customer programme for them in the USA in either GTLM, GTD or indeed both.


With Paul Dalla Lana having purchased one of the factory's new turbo charged GTE cars, the Canadian will be keen to run the his newest car in competitive action in Florida as he and co drivers Pedro Lamy and Mathias Lauda get ready for the reconvening of the World Endurance Championship Super-season from Sebring just a few weeks later before they make a swap to the new chassis for the beginning of the 2019-2020 WEC season in September.


And finally - Bathurst, a completely bonkers circuit being raced on by the fastest GT3 and GT4 cars that money can offer. We saw earlier this year how R-Motorsport had wanted to run one or two of their brand new turbo charged Vantage GT3 cars at next years event. That has be thwarted by a balance of performance regulation for the event that requires a year old car so we still wait to see if they will race one of their older generation V12 Vantage GT3 cars there or not.


Whatever happens, this kind of motor sport will keep even the most demanding of fans happy whilst giving us a final opportunity to bid farewell to the V12 and V8 Vantage GT3 and GT4 cars before we welcome their latest iteration son track for 2019!

Photo credits - AMR / TF Sport / Creventic / IMSA / SRO / FFSA

Another great weekend for Aston Martin Racing success around the world today as Jack Mitchell todays secures the China GT Championship GT4 Drivers title alongside China Equity AMR winning the Team title in Shanghai this earlier morning.

With the results still provisional, todays final race of the season was certainly something of a nervy one as Stanley Yang had to fend off the close attention of the #540 McLaren to a point where both cars actually collided (twice) with one another on only the first corner of the second lap. That contact proved to be the end of the race for the #540 car first spinning and then stopping out on track but at least Yang was able to continue and hold station on track in P3 although his speed had dropped slightly going into the pit stop window.


The cars of the weekend were clearly both KTM X-Bows who had already locked out two steps of the GT4 podium yesterday with Mitchell and Yang splitting the pair to claim second in Race 1 and to go into todays final race 8 crucial points ahead of the #570 McLaren of David McKintyre. The weekend was always going to be difficult for the McLaren due to the superiority of the AMR V8 Vantage GT4 around the Shanghai circuit but the final nail went into the #570's Championship's aspirations after contact with the #619 China Equity AMR car that damaged the McLaren's suspension and power steering - a situation that could well have happened with the #618 Mitchell/Yang car earlier in the race - then the championship positions would have been reversed!


After the pit stops Mitchell was to emerge from the pits to continue the battle with the KTM's with the sister #999 China Equity car alongside. With their championship rivals at the Winning Team clearly not having the track position to contest the championship fight the race was to end with David Pun graciously allowing Mitchell past just before the flag in order for the #618 car to claim both P3 in the race but also the GT4 Drivers and Team Championships in the process.


Well done to the China Equity AMR team for putting the resources into place for the 2018 season to have a truely competitive chance this year after their tentative steps in the clearly expanding series last year where they finished third overall. With the team a significant investor within the Aston Martin Lagonda company we would assume that they will be back in 2019 with several examples of certainly the new AMR Vantage GT4 and even maybe the new GT3 Vantage.

Obviously well done to Jack Mitchell who claims his second GT4 Drivers Championship of the year after lifting the British GT GT4 Drivers Championship last month and we look forward to where about you might pop up in next year as well!

Photo credits - China GT / China Equity AMR

With presumably multiple new Aston Martin Racing Vantage's on order with the Prodrive factory, Partner team China Equity AMR will see out their domestic China GT Championship with four Vantage GT4's running at this weekends finale in Shanghai.

GT4 Championship Jack Mitchell is indeed joined again by Stanley Yang as the team pulls out all the stops to help the recently crowned British GT GT4 Championship overcome his two point championship deficit to lift GT4 class title by the end of Sunday.

After Qualifying today for Saturday's first race of the week, Mitchell was the fastest individual around the Shanghai International circuit and by the time Yang entered his times the duo find themselves starting from P2 on the grid for race 1 tomorrow. His main championship rival, David McKintyre in his #570 McLaren which he will again share with Charlie Fagg will start from seventh in tomorrows opener and a finishing position in that order will create an interesting final race on Sunday.


Joining the #618 car will be three more V8 Vantage GT4's from the Chinese team, the first time since the opening races back in May and all distinctly liveried whilst running almost a new driver line that before in the championship.


The #619 car will run an all Bronze crew of Yves Volte and Tu Rong Zhen, the #721 car another an all Bronze crew of You Zhao and Yang Zhi Yi and #999 car for Shang Zong Yi and the returning David Pun. The #721 and #999 cars certainly appear to have some sort of connection with last years AMR customer team Zea Fea Racing.


Photo credits - China GT / China Equity 

It was great to read so early on into the winter months that Mark Farmer has indeed decided to go public and confirm his continued participation within the British GT Championship into his fourth season and also continue his association with Tom Ferrier's TF Sport in the process for 2019.

Speaking with Farmer at the #DoningtonDecider, a race that he and co driver Nicki Thiim won and then didn't - loosing out to the Barwell team in the process, was that he was already sure that he would be back in to British GT fold having tested the new variant of turbo charged Vantage GT3 at Snetterton back in August - the only unknown then (and still is) around who his co driver would be.

Farmer is a driver who has traditionally purchased his race cars outright, like he did when he first started in GT3's with 22GT Racing and into his tenure at TF Sport and his purchase of the new Vantage GT3 is no different this time either.


“I am excited to re-commit to the British GT Championship for 2019,” Mark stated. “The racing is super-close; the Pro line-up is stellar and the occasions magnificent. We had a great run with the Aston Martin Vantage, and in particular in the last season, with three race wins three podiums from nine starts.

“Sadly, it wasn’t enough to win the Championship, but It was good to take the fight to the wire,” he continued. “We consistently demonstrated our pace but were thwarted by bad luck in a couple of rounds, including a big fire at Spa which almost killed the car!


There has been no official word from Aston Martin Racing whether or not they would make any of their factory drivers available again to their customer teams in 2019. The calendars between the British GT and the World Endurance Championship suggests that it is possible but even Nicki Thiim would like to see a reduction of his own driving commitments after a hectic 2018.

With the new Vantage GT3's not likely to be delivered to the teams until the end of 2018 at the earliest little more can be done by the team or driver to prepare themselves but after all the announcements at Donington of so and so ordering two of those and one of these new AMR's - at least we now know who will be driving one of them and in what!


Also being reported today was the apparent position of 2018 British GT GT3 Champion Flick Haigh not returning to the championship in 2019 to defend her title.

Having also spoken with Shaun Goff (boss of Optimum Motorsport) at Donington last month, he did acknowledge that all avenues allowing 'progressive steps' were being considered by Haigh and the team including European GT3 and indeed GTE racing.

Optimum has acknowledged that they have signed up for two new AMR Vantage GT3's and that you can only purchase a GT3 with a GTE upgrade kit rather than a built GTE platform, so either options could be possible for her.


Whereas Mark Farmer today declared a firm intention participate, todays story of Haigh already not defending her BGT crown just seemed a bit early although Optimum's PR team have since come back to confirm the story to be correct which is a shame!

We will see what the winter brings for her!

Photo credits - Jacob Ebrey /

Our best wishes extend this weekend to the British GT GT4 Champion Jack Mitchell who will travel to Shanghai for the final, championship deciding round of the China GT Championship with his China Equity AMR team.

With the team swapping around his co driver from the regular Ryan Liu to Stanley Yang for the championship's first visit to the street circuit of Wuhan two weeks ago, and despite two P2 finishing positions at that event, Mitchell now finds himself back behind the Winning Team's McLaren 570S of  David McKintyre going in the finale.


The deficit has come about by the #570 McLaren finishing on the top step of the GT4 podium at Wuhan for both races giving McKintyre a slender two point lead of Mitchell and rekindling the battle that both have been enjoying all season.

With twenty five points available per race it is certainly all to play for as China GT returns to the Shanghai circuit again.

Photo credits - China GT