Testing continues apace

Saturday, March 16, 2019

This week has seen a significant increase in the number of Aston Martin Racing customer teams test (mainly across Europe at the moment) as these teams start to receive their orders for new generation GT3 and GT4 cars from the Prodrive factory.

Blancpain GT Series runnings R-Motorsport and Garage 59 were at the Paul Ricard circuit in the south of France earlier this week for the series balance of performance test ahead of their season that starts in Monza in just under a months time. Both teams had a number of absent faces from the test due to driver commitments elsewhere.

New AMR team - Garage 59 were there with their two new V8 Vantage GT3's and had to get the driving assistance of AMR reserve driver Ross Gunn to help as the team evaluate line ups to race alongside the likes of Chris Goodwin and Alex West. These cars tested again in the factory produced white base layer although the team have confirmed that liveries and line ups are due imminently. The R-Motorsport cars looked sublime in their china grey and blue detail.

For British GT runners Academy Motorsport and Optimum Motorsport, their drivers Will Moore and Patrick Mathiessen respectively tested their new Vantage GT4's for the first time this week at both Snetterton and Oulton Park ahead of their season that start in under four weeks time.

From a rather cold and wet looking Zolder racetrack, Belgium team Street Art Racing took one of their new Vantage GT4's out for its first test ready for their two car entry into the this years GT4 European Series.

Like many teams around Europe, they are having to make do with just one car at the moment for their full GT4 driver line up.

Their series rivals, German based PROsport Performance also tested the V8 Vantage GT4 for the first time (albeit the factory development car) at the Circuit de Catalunya in Spain (above) as their prepare for their two GT4 car entry into multi European series whilst the photo below shows another GT4 due for imminent delivery t its new owner after another Ross Gunn shakedown test this week.

Over in Japan, one of the latest teams to convert to the AMR platform for 2019 sees D'Station AMR undertake their first Official Super GT test at the Okayama International Circuit with their new Vantage GT3.

Having already undertaken some tyre testing with their car ready for the highly competitive GT300 campaign, drivers JP Oliveira and Tomonobu Fujii have the driving services of Darren Turner to look forward to.