Three new sportscars have been spied out testing in the past week in Europe and Japan.
At Motegi, a spy shot has been published of the forthcoming Lexus/Toyota GT3 car testing at Motegi by the GT World Challenge America social pages.
The car is expected to debut in 2026, with an FIA WEC LMGT3 programme believed to be high on the wishlist. The unnamed but understood to be Lexus-badged model, will be a direct replacement for the current RC F GT3 with a continuing programme in IMSA’s GTD Pro class, also a very high priority.
In addition, before the debut of the new car, there is a distinct possibility that the Lexus brand will be represented in LMGT3 as early as 2024 with the current car. AKKA ASP is tipped to be the team that fields the V8-powered coupes.
Meanwhile, in Europe both the Alpine A424 and Lamborghini SC63 have been testing at Paul Ricard ahead of their 2024 race debuts.
Spy footage has been published of the Alpine running for the first time by twitter user @Monac_inc.
@0xOzoo : La nouvelle LMDh Alpine 2024 elle claque pic.twitter.com/xfzhEL3TAf
— Ferrara.stark 🚢 (@Monac_In) August 24, 2023
The A424 completed over 1000kms of running at the French circuit, with Matthieu Vaxiviere, Nicolas Lapierre and Charlies Milesi all turning laps.
Unfortunately, Lamborghini’s track time at Paul Ricard was cut short after a significant incident. DSC received a ‘no comment’ from Lamborghini Squadra Corse in response to a request for details.
Screen grabs from circuit CCTV showed the car to have been substantially damaged by an impact with the barriers at Turn 11.
There is no official word on either the car or the driver, understood by DSC to have been Mirko Bortolotti.
DSC will not be reporting on information received from unofficial sources.
In addition to his LMDh testing role this year with Lamborghini, Bortolotti is the current DTM Championship leader and also a full-season FIA WEC contender with Prema in LMP2.
He is one of four confirmed drivers for the Lamborghini Hypercar/GTP effort, which will see the SC63 compete in the full 2024 FIA WEC season and the IMSA Endurance Cup races after Daytona.
Images courtesy of Toyota and Alpine
