Aston Martin races at the Ring

Aston Martin is the latest manufacturer to commit to the Nurburgring 24 hours. Following confirmation of the Lexus LF-A’s appearance and a five-car entry from VW (featuring our man John Barker) comes news that the all-new V12 Vantage will be taking part.

It’s said to be in near-standard specification, too, and will use the production car’s 5.9-litre V12 engine. It’s shared with the Aston DBS, which boasts 510bhp and 420lb ft of torque. Compared to the road car, weight is reduced a tad, there’s the addition of essential safety mods and some P Zero circuit slicks specially selected by Pirelli.

Aston chief Dr Ulrich Bez will be among the drivers, and it’s his fourth consecutive 24-hour race. He said - ‘this is the final engineering durability test for the V12 Vantage programme. We will be subjecting the car to the toughest assessment yet under public scrutiny as we successfully did with the Vantage N24 programme.

‘We already have a proven track record at the Nurburgring racing our road cars with limited modification.’

That’s pretty key – Aston Martin has an untarnished record of finishing the Ring 24 hours, and will be looking to further this on May 23-24 when this year’s race takes place.

Aston Martin V12 Vantage deliveries start in July. It costs £135,000 and production is limited to 1000 cars.