What does ‘Aston Martin racing car’ say to you? For F1 fans, it’s the sleek new AMR25 that Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso will be campaigning in 2025. For classic race enthusiasts? Maybe the 1959 Le Mans, where Carroll Shelby and Roy Salvadori brought their DBR1 home ahead of teammates Maurice Trintignant and Paul Frère for a legendary 1–2 victory.
Good picks, both. But whether measured in hours of racing entertainment, number of wins, championships or class victories, nothing comes close to Aston Martin’s all-conquering Vantage. On some of the toughest circuits in the world, racing flat out for 6, 12 and even 24 hours, the unstoppable Vantage has proved a winner. From Spa to Shanghai, Bahrain to Fuji, that sleek profile has taken 11 World Championship titles, more than 300 class wins and 75 international class titles.
Its racing pedigree goes back to 2005, when Aston Martin launched the first model to carry the name Vantage in its own right. It was the leanest and most agile road car in Aston Martin’s line-up, a two-seat, two-door sports coupé based on a bonded aluminium structure for strength and lightness. Powering it was a 380bhp quad-cam 32-valve V8, with a capacity of 4.3 litres. The engine was front mid-mounted, the transmission was housed in a rear transaxle for impeccable balance, and with a 0–60 time of 4.8 seconds, it was the perfect track-day weapon. A year later, Aston Martin announced a race version with an uprated 410bhp engine, an extra aero kit, a full roll cage, a racing fuel tank, a lone Recaro driver’s seat and polycarbonate windows.
Then-CEO Dr Ulrich Bez, development engineer Chris Porrit, development driver Wolfgang Schuhbauer and German journalist Horst Graf von Saurma-Jeltsch gave the new Vantage its debut in the Nürburgring 24-hour race, finishing fourth in class and 24th overall. After the race, the Vantage was driven home on public roads.
Subsequent wins included a first and second at the 2007 European GT4 race at Silverstone and a clean 1–2–3 sweep of their class at the 2008 Nürburgring 24-hour in 2008. The team followed that achievement with another 1–2 in the ‘Green Hell’ the following year.
2012 saw the arrival of the new LM GTE class and a decade-long string of success, including 52 race wins and 11 championships. Vantage has also thrilled the crowds at Le Mans, winning its class five times, including a nail-biting finish in 2017 when works driver Jonny Adam snatched the lead from a Corvette Z63 on the very final lap.
An all-new Vantage GTE arrived in 2018, powered by an advanced 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8. It made its debut at the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps and took its first victory at the 6 Hours of Shanghai. Better was to follow. In 2019–20, the Vantage GTE recorded five wins from eight races, including both GTE Pro and Am classes in 2020 at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. This run of success took Aston Martin to the FIA GT Manufacturers’ World Championship title and carried Danish works drivers Nicki Thiim and Marco Sørensen – the ‘Dane Train’ – to the drivers’ crown.
From 2024, new LM GT3 regulations saw the Vantage GT3 take over from its predecessor, with all the slick efficiency of a well-drilled pit stop. The Vantage GT3 featured all-new aerodynamics, comprehensively revised suspension and state-of-the-art electronics. Podium champagne was next served in June at the Suzuka 3 Hours, with the Vantage GT3’s first victory in the prestigious Autobacs Super GT Series.
Better was to follow; in the all-GT3 24 Hours of Spa, the Comtoyou Racing Vantage GT3, expertly piloted by works drivers Mattia Drudi and multiple champions Sørensen and Thiim, won the race overall. It was Aston Martin’s first outright victory at Spa in the modern era. Celebrations continued in September when The Heart of Racing team took the Vantage GT3’s first WEC triumph with a brilliant win in the Lone Star Le Mans at the Circuit of the Americas, Texas, during a season when the team achieved class wins in both the GTD Pro and GTD categories.
Endurance racing is the ultimate test of teamwork in motor racing. While the drivers need to hit consistent, race-winning lap times, every member of the crew must also be on point to save vital seconds in tyre changes, fuel stops and driver changes. Invariably, the race will throw up its challenges and the teams that can surmount them amid the chaos calmly, professionally and fast are the ones who’ll take home the silverware. What’s clear is that the combination of race-winning pace, reliability and ease of maintenance, the Vantage in all its guises has been a class act in endurance racing for almost two decades. And neither Aston Martin Racing nor its partners will be resting on their laurels in 2025.
ROLL OF HONOUR
- 11 World Championship titles (2012 – 2023)
- Five 24 Hours of Le Mans class victories
- 300+ class wins
- 75+ major international class titles
- 52 World Championship class victories
- Class wins in the Le Mans 24 Hours, Nürburgring 24 Hours, Spa 24 Hours and Daytona 24 Hours
- First Aston Martin to win the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship
- More than 5.6 million competitive miles
- Best-selling Aston Martin racing car of all time – 380 cars
