AMR-One on hold as Factory reverts to Lola-Aston Martin for rest of racing season

04 Aug 2011

Immediately after the French endurance classic Aston Martin began an in-depth and lengthy technical evaluation of its AMR-One, including bringing in two unnamed engineering consultancies to provide additional input. In the early stages of the evaluation AML chairman David Richards had confidently predicted that a brace of AMR-Ones would be taking part in the Autosport 6 Hours race at Silverstone in September. However that has now changed with the announcement at the end of July that Aston Martin is to revert to last year’s LMP1 class Lola-Aston Martin for the remainder of the 2011 racing season.

Just one B09/60 model, which has been retrospectively renamed DBR1-2, recalling, of course, the hugely successful DBR1 of the late Fifties that was victorious both at Le Mans and in the World Sportscar Championship in 1959, will be fielded. It will take in the three remaining rounds of the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup: the Autosport 6 Hours on September 11th, Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta in America on October 1st and the Zhuhai 6 Hours in China, on November 13th; in addition, the car, built to old regulations that were superseded at the end of 2010, will contest the American Le Mans Series round at Laguna Seca on September 17th.

Over the last two years, the DBR1-2, powered by Aston Martin’s production-based 6.0 litre, V12 cylinder engine, proved extremely effective; often it was the fastest petrol-fuelled car, including at Le Mans in 2009 where it finished fourth overall; by the end of the year it had taken both the Drivers Championship and the Manufacturers and Teams Championship in the Le Mans Series – the modern day equivalent of the DBR1’s achievements 50 years earlier. From 2012, however, the Lola-Aston Martin will no longer be eligible to compete, after enjoying a period of grace this year.

The technical evaluation of the open cockpit AMR-One - designed in line with new for 2011 LMP1 regulations – in tandem with an overall review of the sports-prototype’s future potential, is focused on its 2.0 litre turbocharged, straight six cylinder, engine. Aston Martin Racing’s drivers have been very impressed with the ability of the LMP1 machine’s chassis against all its rivals but, possibly crucially, the effectiveness of the AMR-One’s aerodynamic package is largely dependent on the low installation of the narrow two litre, turbocharged, Aston Martin engine. The good news is that the outside engineering consultancies reported in July that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with either the engine or chassis, and Aston Martin now believes that, with the right time and money, the AMR-One is capable of at least equalling the pace of the fastest petrol-fuelled cars.