Striking Veritas RS III finally revealed and the last IMSA GTP racer

[Wouter Melissen]

Originally launched as a concept car almost a decade ago, the reborn Veritas was destined to become yet another one-off. That changed last year when the rights were bought by Michael Trick's Vermot AG. He picked up the development work and recently the production Veritas RS III was launched to much acclaim. Like its original namesakes, it uses a BMW sourced drive-train. To be more specific, the V10 engine and SMG 7-Speed gearbox that are also found in the BMW M5 and M6. A six-speed manual will be an option. The 507 bhp V10 is installed in a lightweight space-frame chassis, which is clothed in a '1+1' body. There is a room for a passenger but just like on many 1950s sports racers, the passenger area can also be covered to improve the airflow. Thanks to its light weight, the aggressively styled Veritas can accelerate to 60 mph or 100 km/h in just over 3 seconds. The top speed is an equally impressive 216 mph or 347 km/h. The hand-built sports car takes 8 weeks to complete and the company expects to deliver the first cars in January of 2010.
In the early 1990s some of the fastest racing cars ever competed in the IMSA GTP Championship. Thanks to highly sophisticated ground-effects aerodynamics and immensely powerful turbocharged engines, they set a pace that has not been matched since on some of the tracks. Amidst the American built Japanese power-houses Nissan and Toyota, the TWR Jaguar team managed to score quite a few victories with adapted Group C designs in 1989 and 1990. For 1991 TWR developed the XJR-16, which was the company's first and as it would turn out to be only purpose-built GTP racer. Compared to the earlier twin-turbo, V6 engined Jaguars, it featured a revised rear-end and an innovative twin-tier rear wing. In the hands of Davy Jones, the XJR-16 had a perfect debut with a pole position and a victory. It would win another three times but sadly the program was abandoned before the XJR-16 could be fully developed.
The car scored one of its four wins at Laguna Seca in July of 1991. To complement the XJR-16 feature, our friend and GTP nut Marshall Pruett has just uploaded videos of four other GTP races at Laguna Seca on his fabulous website GrandTouringPrototype.com.

Enjoy the links:

1991 Jaguar XJR-16 - Images, Specifications and Information

2009 Veritas RS III - Images, Specifications and Information

Grand Touring Prototype - GrandTouringPrototype.com

[csl177]

Man, that's a needlessly ugly front facia. Like they were trying to create a cartoon car face. I like the profile and rear panels though, and who can argue with it's technical spec? Would like to see photos without the passenger tonneau, and curious of asking price.

Maybe it's just being nostalgic, but something more in keeping with the stylistic simplicity of the original Veritas BMWs would have been more appealing. And yes, I know that several of the original Veritas cars had homely front ends, too.

[henk4]

Originally Posted by csl177

Man, that's a needlessly ugly front facia. Like they were trying to create a cartoon car face. I like the profile and rear panels though, and who can argue with it's technical spec? Would like to see photos without the passenger tonneau, and curious of asking price.

Maybe it's just being nostalgic, but something more in keeping with the stylistic simplicity of the original Veritas BMWs would have been more appealing. And yes, I know that several of the original Veritas cars had homely front ends, too.

an original Veritas, which I think looks immensely better. The new one has borrowed the front end from the Fisker Karma, which somebody compared to the face of the Joker as played by Jack Nicholson.

[LeonOfTheDead]

I thought I wrote my own feeling about the Veritas yesterday, maybe I wrote it in the wrong place...who knows...

BTW, it definitely evolved in the wrong direction I was very interested in the original concept of (gulp) 8 years ago, and in the new car surfaced last year, but this is just a gimmick, over designed, over aggressive...and what's the deal with those gold headlights?!

[togos452]

Thanks for the IMSA GTP racers.