SRT on Thursday unveiled a new racing version of the Viper developed for the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series GT class as well as international GT3 series.

The new SRT Viper GT3-R is being developed by the same Riley Technologies team that has masterminded SRT’s return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans this year.

The car shares its heritage with the GTE-spec — the Le Mans spec — Viper GTS-R: it runs the same suspension and body molds but is powered by a standard version of the road-going muscle car’s 8.4-liter V10 powerplant.

SRT motorsports boss Beth Paretta said, “This project has been spurred on by our customers; the first one is already sold. We believe that the market is there for this car, but we aren’t talking about numbers yet. We are still testing the temperatures.”

Riley Tech boss Bill Riley revealed that the first car should begin testing in August and that deliveries of customer cars could start as early as the end of this year. He believes that the GT3-R, which will sell for $459,000, will prove popular with customers.

“We are about in the middle compared with other GT3s in terms of the purchase price, but we hope to sell cars on durability and low operating costs,” he said. “The engine is so strong and the [Xtrac] gearbox so simple.”

The GT3-R will be the second Viper to compete in GT3 series: the Viper Competition Coupe was among the first batch of cars homologated for the category in 2006.