Aston Martin cuts WEC team to four cars amid Daytona 24 Hours focus

Aston Martin Racing plans to run a minimum of one Vantage GTE in the inaugural event of the new United SportsCar Championship.

It will leave one of the cars that raced in the WEC round at Austin last weekend in the US to test ahead of a potential two-car assault on Daytona.

AMR team principal John Gaw said: "The #98 car will become the #99, which we are leaving in the US for the [USC] tests at Sebring and Daytona in November.

"We'd like to run two cars at Daytona, but we will definitely be there with one. The US is the second biggest market for Aston and it is a great event."

The reduction of Aston's assault on the GTE Pro class from three to two cars will result in a reshuffle of its driver line-up for the final three rounds of the WEC, starting at Fuji in October.

"All permutations are possible," Gaw continued. "We will do whatever is best for us in the championship."

He explained that that included potentially splitting Darren Turner and Stefan Mucke, AMR's two realistic challengers for the World Endurance GT Cup for Drivers.

Frederic Makowiecki, who won GTE Pro at Austin with Bruno Senna, has revealed that his commitments with the Dome Honda team in Super GT could preclude his participation in the Shanghai and Sakhir events in November.

AMR will also return to the Dubai 24 Hours in early January in conjunction with Craft Racing.

It plans a joint assault with the Chinese-based team encompassing one Vantage V12 GT3 for an all-pro driver line-up and one with a pro-am line-up.