Stylized as SUPER GT, the grand touring racing series of Japan welcomes a rather interesting contender for 2020. Enter the Honda NSX-GT, which has a 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6 powerplant relocated to the front and no hybrid assistance at all.
The question is, why did Honda make this rather unconventional change? Isn’t the NSX supposed to be a halo, a mid-engine supercar with world-class performance? While that stands true for the road-going model, the NSX-GT in the clips and photo gallery has been developed in accordance with Class One regulations.
2020 is the first season where Super GT regulations adhere to those of the DTM in Germany, explaining the change brought to the NSX-GT. There’s potential for these regulations to adhere to the IMSA so that similar cars can compete across three series, and that’s a very interesting prospect.
The front-engine layout is one thing, but putting a damper on the mid-engine layout is somewhat strange if you look at the bigger picture. The very definition of a supercar includes an engine in the middle, and the NSX-GT is a different animal from the previous iteration of the racing car as well as the road-going hybrid supercar.
But wait, there’s more! Digging deeper into the reasoning behind this change, it should be mentioned that the NSX-GT was given a weight penalty for dominating the first half of the Super GT championship in 2019. Not even the GT-R could put up a fight, which is why leveling the field had to happen as quickly as possible.
It’s fair to say that one car shouldn’t have a serious advantage over the others, more so when it comes down to the layout of the engine and the advantage of more weight over the mid-rear section of the vehicle. Honda hasn’t released any specifications in regard to the NSX-GT for 2020, but chances are the V6's output won’t be changed from the outgoing racer.
From what we can tell, the twin-turbo powerplant sits behind the front wheels and the exhaust layout now features exits on the sides instead of the rear of the vehicle as a consequence to the front-midship arrangement. 2020 also marks the return of the Supra and Toyota to the Super GT championship, and the R35 GT-R is largely unchanged from the preceding model with the exception of the more aggressive aerodynamic trickery on the sides.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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