Aston Martin Racing is a British auto racing team established in 2004 as a partnership between automobile manufacturer Aston Martin and engineering group Prodrive. The partnership was initially created for the purpose of returning Aston Martin to sports car racing with the DBR9, a heavily modified variant of the Aston Martin DB9. Since the DBR9's racing debut in 2005, Aston Martin Racing has expanded to build a variety of cars available to customers, as well as development of Aston Martin's V12 engine for Le Mans Prototype use. Aston Martin Racing's program has earned several successes over the years. Although all cars are built by Prodrive at their factory, Aston Martin plays an integral part in designing the race cars, as well as integrating elements of the race cars back into Aston Martin's road cars. On 23 April 2009, Aston Martin chairman and Prodrive founder David Richards announced his intent to return to Formula One in with the possibility of using the Aston Martin name, however this never materialised. Aston Martin had previously raced in the 1959 and 1960 Formula One seasons but failed to score points in either year. Cars Aston Martin Racing built cars for international grand tourer classes. The team itself ran a squad of DBR9s in the former top class, GT1, while other cars were offered to customers. The GTE class (formerly GT2) became their next target after the failure of the 2011 season, and the car is based on the V8 Vantage. The V8 Vantage also featured in GT3 and GT4 classes. Before the GT3 Vantage was introduced the DBRS9 solely raced in GT3. In 2008, Aston Martin Racing entered into the Le Mans Prototype category with the aid of Charouz Racing System, installing a DBR9 V12 into a Lola B08/60 LMP1 prototype. On 27 January 2009, the team announced a full works entry in the Le Mans Prototype category for the 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans with the Lola-Aston Martin B09/60. The entry marks the 50th anniversary of its last outright win at Le Mans. The 2009 programme got off to an unfortunate start at the pre season Paul Ricard test on 8 March when Tomáš Enge destroyed the 007 car in an accident. Aston Martin Racing subsequently took delivery of a new Lola to replace the written off chassis. The team entered two LMP1 cars bearing the iconic blue and orange livery of