Huge news today from Heart of Racing and Aston Martin. Ian James and the entire Heart of Racing team—including our own Paul Charsley—will be competing in the hypercar classes of the FIA World Endurance Championship and the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in 2025.
It’s a huge move for Heart of Racing to run the new Aston Martin Valkyrie hypercar with a screaming V12 engine. The scream of a V12 down the Mulsanne straight is already getting me excited!
It’s a big challenge but a terrific commitment from both Heart of Racing and Aston Martin. Ian James is right, it is time for HOR to step in to the premier class of endurance racing and the HOR team is the right team to do it. I’m very excited to see this new program for HOR.
Speaking of excited, I reached out to Paul Charsley to get his thoughts on this huge opportunity for him and the entire HOR team.
“Well to say I’m excited would be an understatement , but also the enormity of the upcoming program isn’t lost on me either! To think just a couple of years ago when Ian asked me to be a part of the program we were just a single car GT effort fighting to get a podium and now we will soon get to hunt for overall honors in WEC and IMSA with Le Mans and Daytona being the ultimate crown jewels.
I think the love of a challenge is always there but this will be by far our biggest one. I’ve loved taking on the factory and top teams in GT and now we get to battle the likes of Penske (Porsche) Acura, Cadillac, Toyota and Ferrari of all things!, doesn’t get any better than that in my book.
Certainly the enthusiasm and support of Gabe Newell and the whole Heart of Racing family, will be a key factor in making this program successful—as it has in the past. Working hand in hand with Aston Martin and Multimatic as we help develop the car is perhaps one of the most intriguing and exciting parts of the whole thing. We will for sure have to grow and change , but I know the DNA of this team will remain the same, and that will be very important for its success. Cannot wait to get started!!!”
Heart of Racing Press Release:
London, England (4 October 2023) – The Heart of Racing will grow its racing program in partnership with Aston Martin to compete in the hypercar classes of the FIA World Endurance Championship and the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in 2025.
The Heart of Racing will make history as the first program to campaign in both WEC and IMSA with the same platform under the FIA WEC Hypercar and IMSA GTP rulesets. The Aston Martin Valkyrie will have a race-optimized carbon fiber chassis with a modified Cosworth-built 6.5 liter naturally aspirated V12 engine that develops over 1,000bhp.
Based in the United States, The Heart of Racing has partnered with Aston Martin since the program’s inception in 2020 and has delivered race and championship-winning campaigns with the Aston Martin Vantage GT3 in IMSA competition. In just a few seasons, HOR has celebrated impressive milestones on and off the track like winning the 2021 IMSA WeatherTech Sprint Cup Championship, winning the 2022 IMSA GTD Class Championship, winning the 2023 Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona in a franchise first for Aston Martin, and making its WEC debut at 24 Hours of Le Mans – all while raising funds for Seattle Children’s Cardiology Research Fund.
“It’s a privilege to be able to bring Aston Martin back to the top of endurance racing with the Heart of Racing,” said team principal, Ian James. “Our team has grown exponentially since we began racing with those famous wings at Daytona in 2020. We understand and are aligned with the ethos of the brand, and have developed our own systems and technologies to extract the maximum performance of the cars we compete with.
“Our understanding of Valkyrie is strong and we have worked closely with it through our customer activation programs for two years now,” continued James. “This HOR team has big ambitions in endurance racing and this is absolutely the right time for us to step into the top classes of WEC and IMSA and challenge for overall honors. This is not an easy target, but between our partners and the support of Aston Martin Performance Technologies, it is one we have all the tools and capabilities in place to hit the bullseye with.”
In 2024, The Heart of Racing plans to return to both IMSA and WEC for its regular seasons while it develops the hypercar program with Aston Martin Racing.
That’s pretty effing amazing. Good luck Paul.