Having taken the world stage by storm with a debuting SP8T class win at the ADAC Total 24N event the weekend after Le Mans 24 earlier this year, one of the AMR Performance Centre's Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4 returns to the scene at this weekends round of the VLN Series.

This weekend sees just a single AMR car entered into the halfway stage of the German VLN Series around the infamous and notorious Green Hell circuit that is the Nordschleife with two very well established Aston Martin runners in the form of Marc Muller supporting American businessman and gentleman driver David Thilenius aboard the #158 SP8T class AMR Vantage GT4.


Having competed together in this years N24 aboard the outgoing Aston Martin Vantage GT8, they and co drivers Tony Richards and Heinz Jurgen Kroner sadly failed to finish the race in the normally aspirated former N24 class winning car.

We hope that this revisit will be slightly more 'profitable' for them!

Photo credits - AMR

Interesting news coming out of Aston Martin Racing today with the confirmation of two new V8  Vantage GT4's being entered by the factory team into the ADAC Total 24H from the Nordschleife this June.

Supported by the local AMR Performance Centre, drivers Alex Brundle, Jamie Chadwick, Chris Goodwin, Darren Turner, Ross Gunn and Peter Cate have all be confirmed.

For the former 2015 British GT GT4 Champion Jamie Chadwick, she has now also now gone on to be confirmed today as another junior works driver for the team and follows in the footsteps of Andrew Watson and Charlie Eastwood who have also recently risen to such status.


With the possibilities of any factory entered GT3's into the race looking a distant possibility for 2019, this news will be the closest that we shall get to that this year. That doesn't necessarily mean that there will be no Vantage GT3's at the N24 this year as Garage 59's co-owner Alex West is presently going for his full Nordschleife Permit in the opening rounds of the VLN Series this year so we will have to wait and see.

Chadwick and Brundle will start upon this AMR project together at next weekends VLN Series race and then again at the Qualification race in May. They will be joined by Aston Martins Nordschleife specialist Peter Cate and AMR factory driver Gunn racing in the SP10 class.

Brundle had his first taster of the new Vantage GT4 at the BRDC Track Day event at Silverstone yesterday.


The second car entered into the SP8T class will be made of of Darren Turner, Chris Harris, Chris Goodwin and Christian Gebhardt with a third Aston Martin - the extremely successful Vantage GT8 being entered by a customer squad.

David King, President, Aston Martin Racing, added: “Jamie is one the brightest talents in the British junior ranks and must be considered among the favourites in the exciting new W Series. We’ve been keeping a watchful eye on her progress and working with her ad hoc since she won the British GT4 Championship in one of our cars and it was clear that the time was right to bring her more formally into the fold so that we may play a deeper role in her career development. 

The second round of the German DMV GTC Series at Hockenheim proved itself to be something of a reality check for the two Aston Martin Racing V12 Vantage GT3's after a good showing by the then single AMR car entered at round one.

Timo Scheibner and his Schaler Motorsport team were back with 'their' bronze and black Vantage GT3, the car that had earned them three credible P4 finishes in the opening two rounds of the GTC Series as well as the Dunlop 60 event.


For round two, Scheibner was joined by the guardian of most of the remaining AMR V12 Vantage GT3 fleet in the world including his car - Alex Lienau who was himself joined by BRDC Chairman and historic racer John Grant - long term friend of both Lienau and Scheibner.

Unfortunately race 1 didn't fair too well for the trio of gentlemen racers as both cars failed to finish through various technical issues with race 2 fairing no better for the Englishman - retiring his car after just one lap.


In Fridays sixty minute Dunlop 60 race, Scheiber at least finished top of his Class 2 opponents although the former AMR Brussels Racing of Lienau and Grant only managed three laps. Later, it transpired that the #14 car may have looked the part in all of its Red Bull livery but it was suffering from fundamental handling issues - issues that a novice GT3 racer like Grant would forever be unable to remedy or control from within the car.

Lets hope that this trio can remedy things before the next round of the Series at the Red Bull Ring, Austria towards the end of May.


Further south in Germany, the second round of the VLN Series suffered no better with Saturday morning Qualifying again getting delayed by morning fog around the circuit before the formation lap could then take place ahead of todays four hour race.

Unfortunately for the 181 cars that did Qualify - racing only lasted two laps before the red was first red flagged and then abandoned due to heavy snow falling around the circuit meaning for a very short day at the office for drivers Marco Muller and Jesse Menczer in the AMR Performance Centre Vantage GT8.

The next round of the series is at the end of the month.

Photo credits - DMV GTC / VLN

Fearful of a year devoid of any full (or even any part season) entry from any Aston Martin Racing customer team in the VLN Series this year has come todays news of an amazing entry for one of the AMR Performance Centre's Vantage GT4's.

The number #150 SP8 has carried a plethora of up and coming as well as established names from within the world of Aston Martin Racing over the years as they have strived to progress, get their full Nordschliefe GT3 licence ready for bigger things over the horizon.

There is no exception to that trend for this weekend with the release of the provisional entry list for the opening round of the 2019 VLN series around the infamous reveals two previously unseen but still well known names.


Former sportscar and Formula 1 racer Martin Brundle joins Alexander West in the #150 Vantage under the watchful eye of the Performance Centre driver Marco Muller as a third driver and AMR reserve driver Ross Gunn also in assistance outside. We last saw Brundle race in an Aston Martin at the AMR Festival from Le Mans back in June last year whilst West is still experiencing his first few events aboard any AMR race platform after his co-owned Garage 59 race team swapped from the McLaren chassis over to the new Vantage GT3 ready for a fresh full season attack in the Blancpain GT Series in 2019.

Whilst the latter is preparing himself ready for the ADAC Zurich N24 later this year, Brundle (who has never raced at the circuit before) will be doing what is required of him in order to qualify for his full Nordschleife Permit so that he and his son Alex can race in a further undisclosed event around the track in an undisclosed car.


It will be interesting to see just how they perform at the Green Hell!

West photo credit - Garage 59 / AMR

After many more months and thousands of kilometres later, the first competitive track action for the new Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3 has finally been confirmed today as being at the penultimate round of the VLN Series at the infamous Green Hell.

First hinted at by AMR's President David King back in May at the ADAC Zurich 24H event, the team have finally confirmed that AMR factory and development driver Darren Turner will be at the helm of their factory's latest GT3 creation with World Endurance Championship team mate Maxime Martin and will compete in the SPX class due to the chassis present non-homologated state.


Data from this year's N24 event from aboard their V12 Vantage GT3 platform will be compared against that being received from the new car during the VLN8 event so makes the event extremely useful to the team and their technicians before the all in important and defining homolagating process begins early next year.

Also confirmed to race at VLN8 will be AMR's WEC reserve driver Ross Gunn who will compete at the Nordschleife for the very first time alongside new recently recruited Aston Martin Lagonda high performance development driver Chris Goodwin in one of the Test Centres Vantage GT4's as both start their path to their full GT3 Nordschleife permit.


Turner will also be on double driving duty that weekend as he will also be listed with another AMR Performance Centre entry for Jurgen Kroner and Marco Muller in the Vantage S.

Since the new Vantage GT3's world debut at the Le Mans Festival back in June the chassis has undertaken thousands of laps of developmental testing all over Europe as well as being made available to the factory's customer teams to test and order ready for the 2019 season. "It is the perfect place to test the car in a competitive environment as we sharpen areas of its development ahead of its homologation" said David King at the announcement.



In terms of the VLN Series itself, it will be great to see more Aston Martin's at the event seeing that the last few rounds have struggled to attract any significant volumes of the marque from amongst their customer base. Last weekend at the VLN7 event saw only Marco Muller and Erik Manning complete in the event aboard the Performance Centre's #150 car as full season entrant's AVIA Racing failed to start the event due to ongoing technical issues with their own GT4 and it is yet known whether they will enter that event or not.

The VLN8 four hour race will be on Saturday 6th October.

Photo credits - AMR