Tuesday 16 July 2013

MX-5 GT Racer

"Mazda is challenging top racing brands Aston Martin, Porsche, Lotus, and BMW on the race track with its lightweight Mazda MX-5 GT entry in the Britcar Dunlop Production GTN Championship 2011. Weighing in at just 850kg, the Mazda MX-5 GT race car accelerates from 0-to-60mph in just three seconds and has a top speed of 160mph"
After successful media coverage and interest in 2010's invitational endurance races with journalists taking part and driving race-prepped MX-5s,   Mazda decided to take things a step further the following year, and in partnership with Jota Sport created the MX-5 GT.  The race car was designed to compete in the Britcar GTN championship; a series of 2 hour endurance races on some of the best tracks in the UK including Silverstone, Thruxton, and Snetterton.  The championship even makes a trip abroad to Belgium for a race at the legendary Spa Francorchamps circuit.
The car itself started life as a standard 2.0 model before being stripped down, bathed in acid, and rebuilt by Jota engineers resulting in a body shell 17 times stiffer than required by the FIA, and weighing just 850kg.  The build was said to have taken 400 hours and also makes use of carbon fibre doors and polycarbonate windows.  The standard manual gearbox was removed in favour of a six-speed sequential paddle shift transmission supplied by Quaife.  An impressive looking carbon fibre dashboard, full roll cage, Sparco race seat, and fire extinguisher finish off the interior.  The MZR engine has been tweaked to produce 275Bhp, enough to propel the lightened car to 60mph in 3 seconds and on to a top speed of 160mph.

Since it's arrival the GT racer's specification has undergone continuous development, with significant upgrades for the 2012 year.  These changes enabled the car to compete in the British GT Championship as perhaps the ultimate modified NC.  The GT4 Roadster now features a gearbox from Hewland Engineering and a turbo charged MZR engine built by tuning specialists Mountune.  This 320Bhp animal can be yours for a cool £150,000.  Now where did I put that lottery ticket...
 GT4 out on track
The Mountune MZR Turbo


You can read more on the MX-5 GT at the links below