A bruising encounter for one Heart of Racing entry but another credible achievement for another at Road America
The new Heart of Racing Aston Martin Valkyrie achieved its best finish yet in global endurance competition at the weekend, when it finished sixth in the latest round of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship at the Motul Sportscar Grand Prix of Road America.
The result marked the sixth consecutive top ten finish for the British hypercar in IMSA, extending its remarkable points run and maintaining its 100% finishing record on its debut season in North America’s premier endurance series. Sunday’s result was the best IMSA finish ever recorded by a car built to 'Le Mans Hypercar' (LMH) regulations, Valkyrie being the only car in IMSA's premier GTP category derived from that ruleset and an actual road going car.
The British contender is also the first LMH car of any kind to compete in IMSA, and the only one contesting both IMSA and the FIA World Endurance Championship simultaneously, having made its competition debut in the Qatar 1812km in February.
Heart of Racing and Aston Martin Racing works drivers Roman De Angelis and Ross Gunn, delivered a solid and competitive performance in an incident-filled two hour and 40-minute race, consistently running close enough to the leaders to pounce on rivals when they hit trouble. And in an event featuring no less than four Full Course Yellow (FCY) periods (where the race was neutralised and run behind the Safety Car), this happened on more than one occasion.
Valkyrie showed promise all weekend, having set the second fastest time in free practice on Friday. Gunn then qualified the #23 Valkyrie 10th for the race, less than 0.7s off the pole position time in a highly competitive 15-minutes GTP-only session on the long and challenging 4.05-mile circuit.
The team opted to keep Gunn on track during the first FCY as others pitted early in the race, giving Valkyrie a competitive track position it then maintained for much of the race. In De Angelis’s hands, Valkyrie then ran as high as fifth as the event moved through its various FCY phases and teams deployed diverse strategies. Into the final uninterrupted 40-minute run to the flag, the hypercar held its own and even extended its advantage over the chasing pack to finish a comfortable sixth, 16.5s behind the winner.
The sister Heart of Racing Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTD entry, however, endured something of a bruising encounter in the same event as British drivers Tom Gamble and Casper Stevenson, qualified second in the GTD class for the 160-minute race, and ran well early on but their #27 car, which won its class at Watkins Glen last month, was damaged avoiding a rival’s accident while running second, being sent airborne as Gamble swerved onto the grass along with another car.
Despite the damage and loss in ultimate performance, the #27 recovered to finish the race ninth in class ahead of both its nearest championship rivals. The car is now third in the standings, 117 points behind the series leader with a victory counting for 350 points and three rounds left to run.
The next IMSA action will be from Virginia International Raceway towards the end of August.
Source material and photo credits - AMR
Heart of Racing set for two car Aston Martin Valkyrie WEC Campaign in 2025
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In October of 2023 the Heart of Racing announced the team would grow to stage a global racing campaign with the Aston Martin Valkyrie, fielding a single entry in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) along with an entry in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.
The Heart of Racing has partnered with Aston Martin since the program’s inception in 2020, with the collaboration generating a consistent yield of impressive results including winning the 2021 IMSA WeatherTech Sprint Cup Championship, taking the 2022 IMSA GTD Class Championship, winning the 2023 Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona in a franchise first for Aston Martin, and most recently scoring the first IMSA and WEC podium in the new Aston Martin Vantage GT3 – all while raising funds for Seattle Children’s Cardiology Research Fund.
“With this new direction of the WEC ruleset we have had to bring forward our plans to run multiple cars in the WEC Hypercar class” said Heart of Racing Team Principal Ian James. “This has obviously condensed our build-up process, but we are very excited about the prospect of having two cars in the field. We will be proud to be a part of this class, which has seen a meteoric rise in the past couple of years, and offers amazing racing and fan interaction. The challenge ahead is immense, and we are looking forward to the journey.”
The Aston Martin Valkyrie has been in production for the past year with a race-optimized carbon fiber chassis with a modified Cosworth-built 6.5 liter naturally aspirated V12 engine that develops over 1,000bhp. Aston Martin and the Heart of Racing Team looks to begin testing in the coming months to prepare for the Valkyrie’s competition debut in the 2025 24 Hours At Daytona in January.
Source material - HoRT
The best news for a long time from Aston Martin and Partners
The Heart of Racing will make history as the first program to campaign in both WEC and IMSA with the same platform under the FIA WEC Hypercar and IMSA GTP rulesets. The Aston Martin Valkyrie will have a race-optimized carbon fiber chassis with a modified Cosworth-built 6.5 liter naturally aspirated V12 engine that develops over 1,000bhp.
“It’s a privilege to be able to bring Aston Martin back to the top of endurance racing with the Heart of Racing,” said team principal, Ian James. “Our team has grown exponentially since we began racing with those famous wings at Daytona in 2020. We understand and are aligned with the ethos of the brand, and have developed our own systems and technologies to extract the maximum performance of the cars we compete with.“Our understanding of Valkyrie is strong and we have worked closely with it through our customer activation programs for two years now,” continued James. “This HOR team has big ambitions in endurance racing and this is absolutely the right time for us to step into the top classes of WEC and IMSA and challenge for overall honors. This is not an easy target, but between our partners and the support of Aston Martin Performance Technologies, it is one we have all the tools and capabilities in place to hit the bullseye with.”
In 2024, The Heart of Racing plans to return to both IMSA and WEC for its regular seasons while it develops the hypercar program with Aston Martin Racing.
Maybe too late for Christmas but too late for next season
As it says on the tin, Swiss based Aston Martin Racing Partner team, R- Motorsport have just announced the opening of their new on-line shop where there is a whole range of replica team apparel and other goodies for you to consider in time for next season' racing events!
Link to their new site is available here - https://shop.r-motorsport.com/en/home
Quoted in Swiss francs - 1 CHF is about the equivalent of 0.79 GBP or $1.02 US
Photo credits - R-Motorsport
