GT3 Racer Shows Its Mettle Against Purpose-Built Competition

As we car nuts know, car racing subscribes to the adage “different horses for different courses”, and even similar disciplines (e.g. track cars) have degrees of specialization and regulations that necessitate specific sets of mods for a given type of racing.

Australian tuner Prep'd Motorsport built up this Lotus Exige to FIA GT3 specs for competing in the Australian GT Championship but has also used the car for other classes of racing, notably the World Time Attack Challenge in 2010 and 2011. If you look at the contenders in the recently concluded WTAC held in Eastern Creek in Australia, there aren’t the stringent rules found in most other forms of motorsport, which may equalize the cars but definitely stifles innovation. Prep’d Motorsport pitted their mid-engined racer against a field where all-wheel drive and 600 horsepower engines were commonplace. In the process, they placed 4th outright, in an event that was dominated by purpose-built time attack cars. Not a bad result at all for a car built for FIA GT3 racing.

Starting from the excellent Lotus platform, the Prep’d replaced the entire body with carbon fiber panels, and side window glass was replaced with Lexan. The team did not need to reinvent the Lotus’ suspension setup, opting only to replace the springs with Eibachs and the dampers with Ohlins custom-valved GTX units. Brakes were also upgraded to AP 6-pot front and 4-pot rears. The car rolls on 18-inch wheels wrapped in the tire sponsor's products for the event.

For power, a Toyota 2ZZ 4-cylinder engine was used, but modified and turborcharged to produce 500+ horsepower with the help of a Motec ECU. This power goes to a Hewland sequential 6-speed with the aid of an AP twin plate clutch. Performance calculations show that this 740 kilo car would have a power-to-weight ratio that easily exceeds the world’s fastest supercars. 0-60 mph is hit in less than 2 seconds. As with any race car, top speed will be dependent on the track configuration.

Other mods include a Motec dash display, carbon fiber dash, Recaro seat and an LCD rear vision display. Built for a different type of racing, Prep’d Motorsport has shown the versatility of their car which put in a very good result in an event it was not originally built for. The top two places were taken by Lancer Evos with unlimited aero and engine mods, and which were exclusively tuned to attack the Eastern Creek course in the fastest time possible.

Source for this post here.

Posted by Horsepower Calculator via gmail