Aston Martin has confirmed that it should finally enter a pair of its Valkyrie halo supercars within the Le Mans Hypercar category for your entire 2025 FIA World Endurance Championship, including the 24 Hours of Le Mans itself.
The company made the announcement on the eve of the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans, confirming that the brand will probably be teaming up with its American working partner, the Heart of Racing team, to campaign the Valkyrie pair in 2025. This follows the brand new category announced today a regulation requiring at the very least two cars in LMH for every manufacturer entry.
It's been a protracted time coming, and Aston Martin was considered one of the manufacturers consulted on the unique Hypercar category rules back in 2017, as share in the highest LMP1-H category dwindled.
After confirming its intention to race the Valkyrie in the primary season of 2020, Aston Martin bumped into trouble and withdrew. He pointed to the choice to permit IMSA's top category cars entry under LMDh regulations, but in addition stated that the aim was to concentrate on its upcoming participation in Formula 1, which is why the corporate was bought by Canadian clothing magnate Lawrence Stroll.
This deprived the network of considered one of its most anticipated cars and considered one of the few intentional entries coming from a road automotive, as the principles were originally intended. Along with other events in 2020, the Hypercar class shrunk to a small variety of entrants – just two with road automotive aspirations – but over the previous few seasons that number has swelled again.
The 2024 race, which can happen next weekend, will feature a record 23 entries within the Hypercar category. This will include defending champion Ferrari on the 499P, deposed champion Toyota and GR010, Porsche 963, SC63 Lamborghini, BMW M Hybrid, Cadillac V-Series.R, revised Peugeot 9X8, recent A424 Alpine and the less powerful Isotta Fraschini Tipo 6 LMH-C.
Aston Martin still must homologate the Valkyrie AMR-LMH before it may gain full-year participation within the 2025 FIA World Endurance Championship. Time will tell how the automotive will probably be adapted to the series.
The 'standard' Valkyrie uses a 6.5-litre, naturally aspirated V12 engine developed by Cosworth, which produces over 1,000bhp. This is significantly greater than the utmost 630bhp allowed by LMH regulations, so it should likely be lowered barely and should not reach the identical 11,000rpm maximum.
However, Aston Martin has confirmed that it is continuous to develop the engine for the “rigors of top-level endurance competition” and that, as with the AMR Pro, the powertrain is not going to feature the hybrid system present in the regular automotive.
The program appears to be in a reasonably advanced state, with on-track testing at Silverstone and Portimao recently accomplished, with homologation expected within the autumn. If it races as expected in 2025, it should be Aston Martin's first appearance within the premier Le Mans class since AMR-One in 2011.
In addition to its year-round participation within the WEC, The Heart of Racing will even promote the AMR-LMH within the GTP category of the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship, which will even likely begin in 2025.
