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[CAR ENGINE]
[SHIFTING THROUGH GEARS]
We're here at Laguna Seca, the American Le Mans Series Race.
And this "ShakeDown" is just going to take a quick look at
the new car in the GT class, the BMW Z4.
There's a lot of technology in it.
We're going to respect that.
We're going to take a look at what we can.
This car is quick, going to be a winner.
[CAR ENGINE]
We'll start with the reality of it being a GT3 class car
brought over to replace the M3.
Rahal Letterman, the team, and BMW took full advantage of the
GT rules and modified the bodywork to be as wide as a GT
can be in ALMS and Le Mans class.
And you can see it with the extensions.
Continuing down the side of the car.
70% of this car, or thereabouts, is still GT3.
But most of the work had to do with aerodynamics, not just
width, but managing the flow of the air.
You can see the ALMS-specced splitter.
You can see the wide fenders to move the air, channel the
air around it, flat bottom.
Wide bodywork again, coming to the front.
Little strakes to manage the underflow of the air.
Flat bottom cars are still all aerodynamic.
Suspensions is GT3 but tuned for ALMS tracks.
[CAR ENGINES]
4.4 liter, V8, you can't buy one.
You can race them.
It makes the car quick.
The wheelbase is about 75 millimeters shorter than the
car it replaced.
Probably why it performed so well at Long Beach.
But they're balancing that for high-speed tracks as well.
[CAR ENGINE]
Coming to the front, you get a full sense of how wide this
car is and the modified bodywork.
If you look at a GT3, the fender shape
is a lot more profiled.
This is very, very flat and straight-sided to flow the air
around the car.
But the splitter has those little air-vorticed generators
to channel air where it needs to go, all of it, again, to
make this a race car that works in the
American Le Mans Series.
[CAR ENGINES]
Suspension, which BMW asked us not to show in detail, is the
GT3 suspension, but modified.
Brakes as well.
The tires they run on are a change from the D tire they
ran last year and the years before to
Michelin, and that's effective.
So 70% of the tech--
the materials, the equipment--
may be GT3, but little by little, this car is evolving
in terms of tuning, setup, adjustment, and running
changes to be an ALMS race car.
[CAR ENGINES]
[THEME MUSIC PLAYING]