I have said before, I will say again, I really like electric cars. Not just the fancy stuff, either. I rented a Chevrolet Bolt in Washington D.C., and it was a perfect little runabout for getting around the DMV — the locals' unexpected and initially confusing nickname for the D.C., Maryland, Virginia area. But.
Although the GR GT3 appears far enough along that it could line up on a start line this season, last we heard, Toyota's prepping the car for competition in 2026. In February 2023, Gazoo Racing WEC team director Rob Leupen told Motorsport,"The date is in alignment with the road car side, which is following the philosophy of Toyota to have a motorsport-bred car on the road," adding that he believed the path to the street went through Lexus.
On the sidelines of this year's Rolex 24 at Daytona, Toyota Racing Development President David Wilson gave Sportscar 365 a timeline of"mid-2026-ish" for the Lexus GT3-derived road car."The homologation has to be done and there are a lot of steps involved. Everything is going to plan, but you have to leave yourselves a bit of leeway.
Toyota still won't detail the powertrain, but everyone's expecting a twin-turbo V8. We hope the sound makes the trip to 2026; FIA regulations mandate that from 2025,"the sound emitted from each car must not exceed 100 dbA during all on-track sessions," measured from about 50 feet away at the edge of the track. So check out the vid and enjoy the noise while you've got it.