It's all but confirmed now.
It's finally official: the Toyota GR GT3 Concept will make it to production, and it will do so with a Lexus badge. The news was uncovered by Motorsport.com after a discussion with Toyota World Endurance Championship team director Rob Leupen, who revealed that the concept will become a real race car to compete in the WEC in Europe from 2026.
More importantly, he said that a street-legal production version is certainly in the works. “The date [2026] is in alignment with the road car side, which is following the philosophy of Toyota to have a motorsport-bred car on the road. This is moving forward at the moment,” confirmed Leupen.
Lexus Enthusiast @Clifford_Valin5/Twitter
When asked about the truth of rumors that the car will arrive with a Lexus badge, Leupen said: “At the moment, it seems to be. It depends on how it develops within Toyota, but at the moment, yes.”
This fits with the last information provided by Toyota earlier this year when Toyota Racing Development boss David Wilson strongly suggested that the concept would form the basis of the next Lexus RC F. Adding more credibility to the assumption that Lexus will get the GR GT3's roadgoing counterpart is that an example of the concept was displayed at a Lexus USA dealer meeting with the luxury marque's brand.
Toyota Toyota
Not long ago, Toyota announced that it had decided to design racing cars for the track first and then create the roadgoing production version from there. This means that the GT3 racer will not be compromised by excessive weight or a less-than-ideal layout. Toyota will build a great racer, and that will inherently translate to a great driver's car.
As for what to expect in terms of power figures, everything that follows is pure speculation as nothing has yet been confirmed or even hinted at.
The current RC F has a naturally aspirated V8 generating 472 horsepower. Its performance is somewhat lethargic, and the headline figures don't compete with current rivals. Therefore, we predict more than the 503 hp currently offered by the BMW M4 and somewhere below what the 671-hp plug-in hybrid Mercedes-AMG C 63 produces. We're guessing north of 600 hp.
Hopefully, we'll have more to confirm soon, but we expect info will dribble out of Toyota HQ at a slow rate until we get much closer to that 2026 launch date.
Lexus
Keyword: Toyota GR GT3 Concept To Become New Lexus RC F