Imagine 530 horsepower generated from a mighty Chev LF3 6,2-litre V8 engine propelling a car weighing just 900 kilograms – that is the treat in store for race fans at Kyalami on Saturday when Johannesburg racer Simon Murray debuts his new Ginetta G57 Prototype.

The car will run in the one-hour Endurance Race and will then compete in all events on the SA Endurance Racing calendar for 2018.

Murray won the local championship in 2016 driving a 2,0-litre Ligier but says his lifelong love of sports car racing meant owning a sports porotype was a ‘bucket list’ item. He ran a couple of races locally in 2017 in a Lamborghini Gallardo and then did three events in Europe in the Ginetta he has now brought to South Africa.

“I needed to find a car that was fully compliant with the latest FIA safety specifications and was powerful enough and fast enough to be a front runner at every one of the tracks we race locally,” he says. “Finally, it had to be reliable and easy to maintain, and the Ginetta satisfied all of those requirements.”

Ginetta is an independently owned UK based road and race car manufacturer offering a wide range of cars for different categories of racing and specialises in designing the technology around privateer racing.

An investment banker by profession and former co-head of Rand Merchant Bank, Murray has secured the services of Stuart Thompson to oversee the preparation of the car, adding: “Ginetta are sending a couple of the factory engineers to Kyalami to help with the setup and to bring Stuart up to speed.

“This is really exciting, and to put it into perspective, the car is faster than the current LMP3 cars in the World Endurance Championship and about the same as last year’s LMP2 cars. It is spectacular.”