Toyota Leveraging Le Mans Racing Experience For Road-Legal Hybrid Hypercar
Toyota is developing a new 'hypercar' that is based on its TS050 Hybrid LMP1 race car that won Le Mans. Called the GR Super Sport Concept, Toyota's Gazoo Racing (TGR) division showed off the at the 86th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, after having first revealed it at the 2018 Tokyo Auto Salon in January. The news at Le Mans is that Toyota is bringing the race car (or hypercar) to the consumer market, meaning it will be road legal at some point.
"The development of Toyota's next generation of super sports car has started. It takes the cutting-edge hybrid electric systems and fuel economy technology that the TGR WEC team has tested and refined during the past six years in WEC, and showcases them in one superb package," TGR said.
Not lacking for power, the GR Super Sport Concept rides a combined 1,000 horses pulled from a twin-turbocharged, 2.4-liter V6 engine (which it shares with the TS050 Hybrid LMP1) paired with an electric drive system. That's a lot of grunt, obviously, and it's going to be ported over from the race track to consumer roadways, no doubt for a pretty penny. Lots of pretty pennies, actually, though Toyota has not yet announced a price or release date.
"Competing in the World Endurance Championship—one of the most demanding motorsports series—and racing at Le Mans—one of the most iconic races—helps us to advance the development of our world-leading hybrid electric technology and enables us to transfer the knowledge we gain into our production cars," said Shigeki Tomoyama, president of Gazoo Racing Company.
There are not a ton of specs to ogle over just yet, though we know it runs on 13-inch wide wheels at the front and rear of the car, giving it copious contact with the pavement. And as you might imagine, there is plenty of carbon fiber to keep the weight in check. Beyond that, we'll have to wait for the finished product to know more.
