Take a Mercedes-AMG GT, GT S and GT3, throw them into a blender and dump it all onto the Nurburgring’s Nordschleife. What you get is the new Mercedes-AMG GT R, unveiled this weekend at the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
It’s the color of a dragon, and it’s pretty much guaranteed to be just as intimidating to those it’s chasing. AMG has learned from their work on the three aforementioned GT models and channeled that knowledge into a car that is, quite literally, built for speed. Confident in the car’s abilities, they’ve even named the car’s color AMG Green Hell Mango, a nod to the track where they spent a significant portion of their development time, and it appears that it will be able to back up its boldness with pure ability.
As you step back and look at AMG’s latest creation, it’s obvious you’re looking at something a bit different than your run-of-the-mill GT S. Wide fenders, a distinctive grille plucked from the GT3 and plenty of other model-specific features are a dead giveaway.
Lift the massive hood and you’ll find the same handbuilt 4.0 liter, twin-turbocharged V8 as the other GT cars, but this one’s pushing 577 ponies, 74 more horses than the now-pedestrian GT S. What you can’t see between the fenders but will definitely feel is the 516 lb-ft of torque, which starts way down on the powerband at 1,900 rpm and stays that way until 5,500 rpm, shoving the car down the road like a land-bound booster rocket.
That power is nice, but it’s all the technical stuff that really makes the car shine. Tuning on the ‘Ring, AMG came up with a carbon fiber airdam that is virtually invisible under the car. When the car is in Race Mode this piece drops downward almost 2 inches at speeds above 50 mph to significantly change the aerodynamics of the car, resulting in a Venturi effect, gluing the car to the road. Active grille louvers and radiator air outlets, as well as a fixed rear wing all conspire to keep the shiny side up at speed while keeping a lower drag coefficient than the GT. Every corner of this car has purpose.
Active rear-wheel steering, adjust-on-the-fly adaptive damping, 9 levels of traction control, speed sensitive steering, an electronic limited slip and myriad other features are also part of this tour de force.
AMG hasn’t told us how much the car will cost, and it isn’t expected to arrive on our shores for about a year, but when it does get here expect it to cost a good bit north of the AMG GT-S’s $131,000 base price.
