2024 Ford Mustang GT3 revealed
Ford Performance has unveiled its next-generation GT3 racer, set to make its track debut in 2024
Following teasers earlier this year, Ford Performance has revealed the 2024 Mustang GT3 in full at the Le Mans 24 Hours. Developed in partnership with Multimatic and M-Sport, the racer will make its race debut next year, competing at the 2024 Le Mans 24 Hours as part of the FIA World Endurance Championship.
Based on the road-going Mustang Dark Horse, the GT3 features a derivative of its naturally-aspirated Coyote V8, increasing displacement from 5 to 5.4-litres. This tweaked unit will be assembled by Ford’s long-time World Rally Championship partner M-Sport, based in the UK.
Director of Ford Performance Motorsports, Mark Rushbrook, said: ‘We start with the production Mustang body-in-white and Coyote production engine, but we increase the capacity from 5- to 5.4 litres. [It has] the production block and heads but many other changes, including a dry sump. The engine is positioned as low and as far back in the car as possible. We have been able to increase the wheelbase over the production car too.’
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Multimatic, the firm behind Ford’s highly successful GT racer, is also part of the program. Mark Rushbrook, Global Director of Ford Performance Motorsports said: ‘For a project like the Mustang GT3, we turned to two of our most trusted partners in the motorsports world to help bring this vehicle and program together. I know we’ll all be as thrilled as Ford fans when Mustang begins racing at the highest levels of GT racing in 2024.’
Unlike the road car, the Mustang GT3 utilises lightweight carbonfibre body panels for its aggressive, sculpted design. Being a GT3 car, aerodynamics are also a high priority, with a large front splitter, rear wing and diffuser setup designed to generate the downforce required.
Under the skin, it features a rear-mounted transaxle transmission, short-long arm suspension and a host of other bespoke components. The model is also the first to feature Ford Performance’s bold new logo, simplified for ease of recognition on and off the track.
Speaking about the model’s Le Mans debut next year, Ford CEO Jim Farley said: ‘Ford and Le Mans are bound together by history. And now we’re coming back to the most dramatic, most rewarding and most important race in the world. It is not Ford versus Ferrari anymore. It is Ford versus everyone. Going back to Le Mans is the beginning of building a global motorsports business with Mustang, just like we are doing with Bronco and Raptor off-road.’
Germany racing team Proton Competition is confirmed as the first customer team to adopt the racer, campaigning two Mustang GT3s in the FIA World Endurance Championship next year.
Rushbrook also added: 'We are also developing the GT4 Mustang racing car and a Dark Horse R model: a customer race car based on the production car with a roll cage, fuel cell - everything you need to go racing. There will also be a Dark Horse S - similar but less geared to racing, more for customers who want to focus on track days.'
