Nissan wins the Bathurst 12 Hour with GT Academy drivers behind the wheel

3 years in the past they had been simply playing Gran Turismo on their playstation . the day gone by they beat the satisfactory within the world to win the Bathurst 12 Hour because the Nissan GT-R have become the new king of the Mountain.

before yesterday’s race, in case you requested any of the punters at Australian motorsport’s holy land, Mount panorama, none would have hopefully anticipated that the Nissan GT-R ought to win one of the international’s first-rate races.

How could they? that they had an experienced, but crash-proned eastern driving force and  blokes from Europe who was gamers. They might be racing towards the first-rate drivers within the international, at one of the global’s maximum difficult race tracks.

however 12 hours, 20 protection motors and a kangaroo on target later, the Nissan Motorsport GT-R, with its two GT Academy drivers proved the world incorrect.

Wolfgang Reip, the winner of the 2012 european GT Academy competition started the race for Nismo, driving a immense stint of almost three hours. That included a second where he overtook several automobiles down the famous Conrod instantly at over 250km/h leaving the commentators and spectators the world over in whole awe.

while Florian Strauss, the 2013 German GT Academy winner called off his holiday in Thailand early after receiving the call to race when the group’s original motive force Alex Buncombe stayed within the uk after his spouse was overdue for his or her first infant. The big German had a irritating time frequently caught behind the protection automobile, however once he turned into racing, he extra than held his personal in opposition to global champion drivers.

The team’s different motive force Katsumasa Chiyo also became a fan preferred for everyone looking the race. He was blindingly short, enormously genuine and polite in his interviews and produced some of the best four mins of riding you will ever see to win the race for his team.

The win in Bathurst become the first ever for each Strauss and Reip, each of whom now have more ammo to throw in opposition to drivers who appearance down on the GT Academy graduates.

 “different races chuckle at us [GT Academy drivers], however even they use simulators like ours to educate,” Reip informed information.

“I never idea in my lifestyles i'd be in Australia, let alone racing right here,” he said.

at the same time as Strauss felt very plenty the identical, telling news.com.au “it’s simply all my dreams coming actual.”

“It’s a piece of a hidden application we need to do greater with, as you could see the satisfactory of drivers it’s producing,” said Nissan Australia CEO when requested how he feels about the GT Academy.

“I assume we probably underestimate what it’s like for a man who  years in the past didn’t have a racing license and is now racing inside the dark at Mount panorama.”

The brain child of Darren Cox, Nissan’s worldwide motorsport director, the GT Academy is an international competition that gives Gran Turismo players the as soon as-in-a-lifetime opportunity to turn out to be a actual-existence professional driver.

Any player who can prove their using competencies inside the virtual global can compete on a real song in a actual car.

The prize? A $1 million contract to race for Nissan Motorsport across the world.

this system has been nothing but a achievement, with inaugural winner Lucas Ordonez now a formidable force in global motorsport for Nissan, prevailing some of the maximum coveted races in the world at tracks like LeMans, Spa and Germany’s Nurburgring.

The cutting-edge poster boy for GT Academy even though is 22-12 months old Brit Jann Mardenborough.

because prevailing GT Academy in 2011, he has long past from power to strength and presently races in GP3, the formula 1 feeder series. He has even signed a contract to pink Bull’s components 1 improvement program, the equal program that cutting-edge F1 drivers Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel went through.

“if you had no enjoy at all at riding something in real life, and also you had a pedal setup in a rig and had Gran Turismo 6, you can leap from that right into a real automobile, and drive it very near the restrict or on the restriction,” Mardenborough advised news.com.au on the GT Academy international Race Camp in Silverstone last year.

at the same time as the drivers may additionally have were given their foot inside the door with video games, they need to do so a whole lot greater to show their using worth. all the demanding situations at race camp are devised with the aid of a number of the quality brains in worldwide motorsport and are designed to split the men from the guys, and then to split folks that suppose they want it from people who actually need it.

signs and symptoms are looking exact for this system to go back to Australia this 12 months, with Mr Emery telling information.com.au that Nissan Australia hoped to bring this system again to Australia this year, however turned into now not capable of affirm a hundred per cent that it turned into locked in.