After 11 years in customer racing, Audi has combined the best of its technologies to create the most powerful car yet for its customer racing program: the R8 LMS GT2. Based on the road-legal R8 Spyder, the LMS GT2 takes speed and power to a whole new level. Using the R8 Spyder chassis, Audi equips the beast of a machine with a naturally-aspirated 5.2L V10 engine coupled with a seven-speed double-clutch S tronic transmission — churning out a whopping 640 horsepower and 550 Nm of torque. That brings the race car up to 123 horsepower per liter of displacement — the most powerful ever seen in the history of the customer racing program.
Oliver Hoffmann, CEO of Audi Sport GmbH, Chris Reinke, Head of Audi Sport customer racing and nine-time Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen together with the Duke of Richmond – the organizer of the Goodwood Festival of Speed – unveiled the new sports car. The expert audience enthusiastically watched the premiere of the sports car with an output of 470 kW (640 hp) – the most powerful one in the eleven-year history of the customer racing program.
“This sports car with its emotive high-performance V10 engine marks the top end of our customer racing program. The legendary event at Goodwood is the ideal venue for unveiling such a fascinating sports car,” said Oliver Hoffmann.
The race car has been created for a future racing category. The GT2 class will come to life in Europe and North America in 2020. It will fill a gap between the existing GT3 and GT4 categories and specifically feature cars with high longitudinal dynamics. Consequently, this type of race car addresses gentleman drivers who have been the backbone of GT racing for decades.
The Audi R8 LMS GT2 is the ideal sports car for classic fielding in races, as well as being suitable for Track Days and events at Race Resorts, which enjoy increasing popularity among this group of customers worldwide.