2000 Marcos Mantara LM600EVO GT1 - Brutal 7.0L LS6 V8 Sound Racing at Zandvoort & Spa!

The last time I thought about a Marcos race car must've been almost 20 years ago when I saw one at my local track and raced one in Toca Race Driver 2. Until this year, whitnessing the comeback of this incredible beast, affectionately named ''La Bomba'', I had frankly forgotten about the brand, despite being quite a big fan as a kid.

La Bomba is no ordinary Marcos Mantara. In 1995 it was born as a Mantara LM600 bought by Cor Euser who then effectively became the factory racing team under Marcos Racing International. Until 1999 he succesfully ran the car in various GT championships and big endurance races such as the 24h Le Mans. After the 1999 season it was decided the LM600 needed serious upgrades to stay competitive and so Euser and Eurotech Engineering came together to acquire the Marcos motorsport division. From then on, all racing cars were built in the Netherlands. Eurotech brought in established (GT1) designer Wiet Huidekoper who completely redesigned the Mantara into the curvaceous bombshell that it is today. This body was now sitting on a tubular chassis and inside it was put a mid-mounted 7.0L (427) Chevy LS6, coupled to a Hewland 6-speed and a massive - but lightweight - aluminium torque tube and trans-axle.

Four cars were built in this spec and competed at various levels of global GT racing. The upgrades were a succes and ''In 2000 alone the LM600EVO won several rounds of the FIA Euro GT as well as overall season championships by Cor Euser & Calumn Lockie in the British, and by Miguel Ángel de Castro & Balba Camino in the Spanish GT championships.'' After the fall of GT1 and GT2 racing, La Bomba competed in the Dutch Supercar Challenge until it crashed in 2012 after which the car was retired.

Luckily for me and every other petrolhead who got to enjoy this car since, in 2023 the car was done being rebuilt and campagined in various historical events. After getting an incredible amount of attention at Goodwood and winning some races in the Masters Endurance Legends, the car is now well and truly active again and I filmed it during the Spa Classic by Peter Auto and during the Zandvoort Historic Grand Prix.

Thank you for watching!

#racing #v8 #endurance #gt1 #marcos #chevy

00:00 Intro (Racing)
01:02 Details
01:38 Start-Up
02:02 Racing (Zandvoort)
03:33 Lock-Up
03:54 Back to Racing
04:29 Racing (Spa)