After an impressive showing in last year’s Nürburgring 24-hour race with its V8 Vantage N24 development car, Aston Martin will be making a high-profile return to the endurance classic this year on June 9/10.

No fewer than three N24s have been entered, the factory team fielding ‘Rose’ – the yellow veteran of last year’s race – together with a newly built car equipped with the company's 'Sportshift' hydraulic manual transmission, while a third, privately owned N24 is being run by a team of Belgian racers.
Aston is also aiming for overall victory with a DBRS9 racer run by Phoenix Racing and Aston Martin Austria. Modified to take full advantage of the event's relaxed rules, the sinister matt-black DBRS9 features a higher-downforce aerodynamic package and will be driven by a crack squad of Ring experts, including Klaus Ludwig.

The complete driver line-up for the pair of factory-run N24 cars is yet to be finalised, but it includes Aston’s CEO Dr Ulrich Bez together with chassis dynamics engineer Chris Porritt, Wolfgang Schubauer from Jaguar’s chassis development team, German journalist and Nordschleife expert Horst von Saurma and evo’s very own Richard Meaden.

If you can’t make it to the race you can keep up to date by listening to the Radio Le Mans team, who will be broadcasting live from the Nordschleife from June 8 to June 10. You can hear the commentary by logging on to www.radiolemans.com or by selecting Sky channel 0157.