Genesis Confirms First GMR-001 Engine Fire-Up

Photo: Genesis

Genesis Magma Racing has revealed that the first engine fire-up for its V8 twin-turbo engine that will be in the GMR-001 Hypercar came in late February, in preparation for its FIA World Endurance Championship debut next year.

The Korean manufacturer, which took the wraps off the livery of its car on Wednesday, retroactively confirmed that the first-up procedure went “exactly as planned” which marked a “key milestone” in the development of the program that will also see the car compete in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship beginning in 2027.

Overseen by Hyundai Motorsport’s head of powertrain Julien Moncet, the 3.2-liter V8 powerplant is based on Hyundai’s current turbocharged inline-four engine that it uses in the World Rally Championship, which has been produced in-house since 2017.

The two units share roughly 60 percent of the parts.

“The I4 engine is a very, very sophisticated, very efficient engine,” said Hyundai Motorsport technical director François-Xavier Demaison.

“It’s a proper race engine, so it’s a very good base for developing an engine for WEC. Rallying is a sort of endurance race, so for an engine to the 24 Hours of Le Mans it’s a good place to start from.

“With the time we had available to develop the engine we immediately knew we did not have time to completely design a new engine from scratch.

“For the main part of an engine you need a long time to design, validate and of course to produce. Every part needs to be tested over many kilometers, and the I4 engine from our World Rally Championship car has already been well proven.

“It became the logical step to carry over as many parts as possible from the 4-cylinder engine.”

Design work on the V8 engine began last June and was completed by October ahead of its first scheduled fire-up.

Further technical details of the engine and powertrain will be revealed later in the development process according to Genesis.

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John