Lamborghini joins the Le Mans hypercar crowd with the SC63

If you thought 2023’s 24 Hours of Le Mans was good, wait until next year when Lamborghini joins the hypercar fray.

The Italian marque has used the Goodwood Festival of Speed to whip the covers off the SC63, which comes under the control of its Squadra Corsa motorsport division.

“The SC63 is the most advanced racing car ever produced by Lamborghini and it follows our roadmap ‘Direzione Cor Tauri’ laid out by the brand for the electrification of our product range,” said Stephan Winkelmann, Lamborghini’s Chairman and CEO.

“The SC63 LMDh is the step into the highest echelons and into the future of motorsports for our Squadra Corse.”

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The car will race in two series in 2024 – a single entry in both the World Endurance Series and the American-based IMSA Championship – and both cars will race at the 2024 Le Mans enduro.

It’s expected to make its competitive debut at the second round of the WEC series in Qatar in early March 2024.

As hard as it is to believe, Lamborghini has never competed for outright honours at Le Sarthe. The wildly successful 2023 event featured hypercars from Cadillac, Vanwall, Porsche, Toyota, Ferrari, Peugeot and Glickenhaus, and the addition of Lamborghini in 2024 will bolster the already packed field.

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Feeding air to the engine are NACA ducts on the rear three-quarters that, according to Lambo designers, pay homage to the mighty Countach.

Hypercar regulations currently restrict output to 500kW, and Lamborghini has taken the unconventional step of adopting a brand-new twin-turbocharged 3.8-litre V8 for the rear-wheel-drive SC63, which, according to them, was developed exclusively for the SC63. Could this be a hint towards a potential future powertrain choice?

The petrol motor, which combines with a small category-spec electric motor within the gearbox, runs its turbochargers on the outside of the block, rather than in the hot vee which has become the norm in recent years.

Feeding air to the engine are NACA ducts on the rear three-quarters that, according to Lambo designers, pay homage to the mighty Countach.

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The SC63 will sport a Verde Mantis green exterior with a black Nero Noctis stripe over the cabin, front bonnet, carbon diffuser, rear fin and wing.The cars will also feature green, white and red Italian Tricolore colours.

The SC63 will be run by Italian team Iron Lynx, which currently fields Huracan GT3s in European competition. It’s been developed with the help of French motorsport chassis maker Ligier, one of the four companies that teams are required to work with to build the chassis of their respective hypercar.

“Being involved in such an ambitious project is a once in a lifetime experience,” said Iron Lynx Team Principal and CEO, Andrea Piccini. “We are honoured and extremely excited to be part of it and to start a new chapter for Iron Lynx with Lamborghini.”

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While the car on display at Goodwood this week is only a show car, testing for the 2024 season starts in earnest in a couple of weeks, according to Lamborghini.

While driver line-ups are yet to be finalised, former F1 drivers Romain Grosjean and Daniil Kvyat have been involved in the program since its announcement in 2022.