NISMO: NISSAN IN MOTORSPORTS TODAY
In addition to its ever presence in the digital space, Nismo is still active, successful and innovative in real world motorsport.
There is no better illustration of the spirit of innovation than the Nissan DeltaWing, a stunning experimental race car concept which features half the weight, half the horsepower and half the aerodynamic drag of a traditional Le Mans sports car. As a result, it uses half the fuel and tyres of a conventional racer...
Official unveiled in March 2012, the car made its competitive debut at the Le Mans 24-Hour Race three months later. It was entry number 56, a special privilege reserved by the event organisers for vehicles featuring new and innovative technologies. The DeltaWing certainly made headlines, in part because it was unceremoniously barged into the tyre wall and out of the famous endurance race by a rival before being able to fulfil its full potential.
Despite the car's retirement, the weekend was a huge success not only for the DeltaWing project, but also for Nismo. A quarter of all race entries were running with Nismo engines and in the LMP2 class they powered more than half of the competing cars.
Team DeltaWing was not disheartened after Le Mans and in October its hard work was rewarded. At the gruelling 1,000-mile Petit Le Mans race in Atlanta, the final round of the ALMS season, the DeltaWing achieved its first ever race finish. Despite being hit again by a rival during practice, and despite starting from the back of the grid of 42 cars because it was an unclassified entry, the car eventually took a tremendous fifth place overall. At one point it was as high as third, and driver Gunnar Jeannette completed a quadruple stint without needing to change tyres - proving the true potential of this amazing design.
The same weekend Nismo confirmed two new key appointments to its racing programme, highlighting just how important competitive success is to Nissan's future plans on and off the track.
Darren Cox, one of the driving forces behind the DeltaWing, was appointed as Director, Global Motorsports covering strategy and marketing. He will also be the global driver of the company's numerous racing programmes, including the SuperGT Championship in Japan and the V8 Supercar series in Australia.
The second appointment saw Jerry Hardcastle appointed as Technical Director for Nissan's Motorsport Programmes. He continues in his role as Chief Marketability Officer for Nissan, and also technical liaison for Infiniti - Nissan's global luxury brand - as a key partner to the Infiniti Red Bull Racing Formula 1 team.
Illustrating just how important Europe is for Nismo, both Darren and Jerry will be based at Nissan Technical Centre Europe (NTCE) at Cranfield, UK.
Nissan's mainstream motorsport programme is focused on the stunning GT-R Nismo GT3, for both works and privateer customer teams. During 2012 it competed in many race series across the globe and secured numerous victories. It outperformed the competition at Japan's SUPER GT series (GT 300 class) and Super Taikyu (GT3 class), as well as the British GT Championship and GT Cup.
Its replacement is the 2013 Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3, which has been developed using data and feedback from last season to enhance its competitiveness and performance.
It's still powered by a 3.8-litre twin-turbo V6 engine developing 405kw (550PS) and 637Nm of torque. However, significant improvements have been made to engine performance and durability, aerodynamics, brake balances and suspension. The car's gear ratios have also been revised to optimise the engine output increase.
The car is built to customer order and is priced at €335,000. An upgrade pack is available for owners of the 2012 car.
Please follow this link to access Juke Nismo full press kit: www.nissan-live.com/nismo
