Ginetta is building a 600bhp V8, carbon fibre supercar

Ginetta’s most ambitious road car in its 61-year history is a front-engined, rear-drive coupe with a carbon fibre chassis and a full carbon fibre body. The engine is a naturally-aspirated V8 which Ginetta says it has designed and manufactured in-house.

Combining its 600-plus horsepower with light weight and race car-derived suspension and aerodynamics will, says the firm, result in true Ginetta giant-killing performance like that which characterised Ginetta cars of the past, dating back to the first G4.

“This is not another supercar from a car company: this is a supercar from a top-tier motorsport manufacturer,” says Ginetta.

The new car, tipped to make its first appearance at the Geneva Motor Show in March, will be hand-assembled at the Ginetta plant near Leeds. Ginetta claims a high degree of in-house manufacturing ability, with autoclaves and CNC machining capability as well as a design studio all on site.

Ginetta was founded in 1958 but taken over and reinvigorated by businessman and GT2 Le Mans winner Lawrence Tomlinson in 2005, who was responsible for introducing cars like the G40, G55 and G60. He said: “We’ve come a long way in 60 years but we still believe Ginetta has great untapped potential. In the 1960s our G10 was a giant-killer on and off the track, regularly beating Jaguar E-types.”

Tomlinson said the new supercar would be an “uncompromised yet utterly capable road-going supercar.”

Today’s surprise reveal of the so-far unnamed coupe represents yet another highlight in the booming fortunes of British sports and supercars. As well as McLaren’s remarkable rise, Aston Martin’s dramatic resurgence and the much-hoped-for renaissance of Lotus, new models we hope to see hitting our roads soon include a wide-body Morgan, the reborn TVR Griffith and Gordon Murray’s mid-engined superlight sports car, among others.

Has there ever been a time when made-in-Britain enthusiast sports cars were as impressive?

Ginetta G4 image by John Colley.