2013 VDS GT 001-R

After a long career in sports car racing Raphaël van der Straten of VDS Racing Adventures revealed the first race car to carry his own nameplate. Built around a Gillet Vertigo, the GT 001-R will contest GT2 races hosted by Creventic with a goal of reaching Le Mans.

The GT 001-R is largely a Vertigo .5 Spirit and shares the model’s 480 bhp Maserati V8 engine and a lengthened version of its carbon fiber chassis.

Van der Straten’s father raced Mustangs when he was growing up and the influence was extended to the GT 001-R’s overall style.

Talking to endurance-info.com he reveals how the project came about “The initial idea was to produce a Vertigo with a different “touch” (a.6). When talking to Tony Gillet … Tony then introduced me to Charles van den Bosch, to whom I gave a few ideas and requirements. Very quickly he came up with a few projects that were quite unconventional and which up to a point I liked. Then one day, in a series of sketches, the one that was to become MY car appeared. That was it, it couldn’t be anything else. Charles had managed to reproduce on paper something I had in my head. And then came Patrick Bataille, who had studied the project’s feasibility and produced a 1/1 scale model. Then followed a lengthy period of styling tests, proposals, some small dilemmas regarding the car’s details (lights, grill, exit for the exhaust, etc.). Patrick had succeeded in making the project three dimensional. As for Tony Gillet he was the conductor, it was he who introduced me to all the people that have allowed me to make my dream come true today.”