We have just told you about McLaren’s new Vantage and we already have the first pictures of the racing version of its 720S supercar. The 650S GT3 has only been on the motorsport scene for two years, but McLaren is already planning the car’s replacement. It’s the 720S GT3, and it’ll be developed in 2018 ahead of a 2019 customer racing debut.

Since it’s still early days for the car, all we have to look at thus far are these two design sketches. Already though, you can get a sense of how mean this thing is going to look IRL. The 720S GT3 will be developed in-house at McLaren, whereas the 650S GT3 was developed by CRS racing. Woking’s deal with CRS will finish at the end of the 2017. We can expect the McLaren-developed 720S GT3 to use the same 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 as the road car, but it’ll need to be heavily restricted to less than 500bhp for some racing series, with the power varying depending on regulations.

Meanwhile, road car’s the active rear wing will have to go in favour of the huge fixed version we can see with the sketches. Also on the menu is a chunkier front splitter, more aggressive side skirts, and a hefty rear diffuser flanked by some particularly awesome cutaway sections around the rear wheels. We’re looking forward to seeing it tearing up the world’s race tracks…