TF Sport Orders New Aston Martin GT3, GT4 Cars

TF Sport has ordered three of Aston Martin’s new-for-2019 GT cars and is planning to use them in an increased GT3 and GT4 program next year.

The British outfit confirmed two 2019-spec Aston Martin Vantage GT3s and a single Vantage GT4, with a view to running additional cars next year, according to team director Tom Ferrier.

It currently runs two GT3 cars in the British GT Championship, an additional V12 Vantage GT3 in the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup, and a previous-gen Aston Martin GTE in the FIA World Endurance Championship, but hasn’t entered a GT4 since 2014.

“We’ve ordered some cars,” Ferrier told Sportscar365. “I think some of our customers, individually, will buy cars as well. Mark Farmer will buy his own car.

“The plan is to run two GT3s and two GT4s in British GT would be the idea. Two GT3s in Blancpain.

“The car is convertible to GTE spec as well so possibly we’ll do ELMS with it, or WEC in the next year. It’s a good option for the moment.”

TF Sport was invited to Prodrive’s test of the new GT3 car at Donington Park last week and gave track time to potential customers Salih Yoluc, Derek Johnston, Adam Balon and Paul Bailey.

Ferrier said Yoluc’s main target is to secure a place on the grid at the 2020 24 Hours of Le Mans, and that an ELMS entry, with the new GTE model, is the most likely path to achieve this.

He praised the new car’s design, which allows for an upgrade kit to convert the GT3 model to GTE specification.

“It’s a nice option to have in terms of a business point of view,” Ferrier said.

“You can do anything you need in GT3 and if you’ve got customers who want to make the step to GTE, you can stay in the same car, do the upgrade kit and go and do it.”

TF is the second confirmed customer for the new Vantage GT3, following Paul Dalla Lana’s order earlier this year.

Aston Martin Focusing on Low Volume, High Quality GT3 Rollout

The British manufacturer will sell its new GT3 car to select “quality teams” to begin with, according to AMR president David King.

While King wouldn’t reveal how many cars have been sold, he did tell Sportscar365 that he’s targeting to have “10 or 12” cars racing in the first six months of the program.

“We are being careful to restrict supply early on,” he said. “We’ve got a lifetime target for volume but there will be a small number supplied in the first six months, 10 or 12 cars, or something like that. We’ll rack up supply after that.

“We’ve got some serious customer teams interested in GT3, which is good. I’d rather have a small number of cars in a small number of really quality teams than flogging cars to anybody.

“If we can get Blancpain, and British GT and maybe ADAC [GT] Masters covered with GT3 cars in the next 12 months, that would be really good.”

King hinted that the car could make its race debut later this year, in a similar fashion to Porsche running its new 911 GT3 R un-homologated in 24H GT Series and VLN races recently.

While it did enter the Aston Martin Racing Le Mans Festival with Ross Gunn, King described it as a “public demonstration.”

John Dagys contributed to this report