Under a beautiful blue sky the usual track day in anticipation of tomorrow’s VLN race saw a wide variety of new cars take to the track. Fans and participants alike saw not just one brand new GT3, but two, as Porsche joined Mercedes-AMG for the Friday test on the Nürburgring. And they weren’t the only two interesting cars making their appearance today.
The carbon blank Porsche 991 GT3R made it’s first semi-public appearance today. The car was presented last May at the 24 hours of the Nürburgring, but had been spotted before in private tests on the Nordschleife and Monza. Today, however, Manthey wasn’t hiding anything in the always well-visited pre-VLN test day as Martin Ragginger did some fast laps in the car.
While nothing is officially confirmed yet, it seems likely that the GT3R is near race ready and is expected to make its race debut well in advance of the previously announced Daytona 24 hours in January.
The two brands from Stuttgart weren’t the only ones today with something new to try out: BMW Motorsport brought an updated version of the BMW M235i Cup racer to the Eifel, with most noteworthy change being the addition of a rear wing.
Another new car that was spotted was the SEAT Léon Cupra of 2014 Clio Cup champions Aimpoint Racing. It’s the first full blown TCR-spec touring car seen in connection to VLN, but it won’t race this weekend. That will happen later this month, when the Friedhoff family-owned team enters the Léon in the last two races of the season, in preparation for a full assault in 2016 when VLN and the 24 hours of the Nürburgring introduce a class exclusively for TCR cars.
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