Calling all budding living room racing drivers: do you yearn to one day swap your PS3 console for real race car driving? Yes, in a real car with an engine and tyres, on a track with tyre barriers that hurt if you hit them? Do you yearn to compete on the international stage where your sponsors demand victory at all costs and the media scrutinise your every word, tweet and intonation? Of course you do, but until then and without all the pressure that that comes with it, you’re just you, playing Gran Turismo every night until the sun comes up. What a life.
The Nissan PlayStation GT Academy has got to be the competition for you. Between 15 October and 10 December, for the first time in South Africa, you can finally put those PlayStation skills to good use and make your mark on the massive world of the GT Academy. You can enter the competition online, at any Nissan dealership, or at specially hosted events around the country until the competition closes in December. 16 finalists are chosen online and 9 from the other events to make up the final 25.
From there they are whittled down to the final 8 who are sent to ‘race camp’ at the home of motor racing, Silverstone, in January 2013. A final winner will compete in the Silverstone 24hr race in a Nissan race car. Come on… You’ve got to enter. The Nissan PlayStation GT Academy has grown monumentally from 25 000 entrants to 800 000 over the last four years since its inception. Lucas Ordonez from Spain was a past winner and now he competes in the European Le Mans Series and quite amazingly he took second place at the prestigious Le Mans 24hr race last year, in his first drive for Nissan. The youngster also has a MBA, which he finished just after winning the GT Academy. Don’t give up your day job just yet is probably the best advice we can take from that.
Ordonez was on hand at the media event held for the Nissan PlayStation GT Academy programme at Zwartkops yesterday and he says the main difference between the game and real life is that 300 km/h down the back straight at Le Mans is much scarier in real life than it is in the game. He also says that simulators like Gran Turismo do provide great ways to prepare you for a race. Ordonez learnt the Nurburgring for his first 24hr race there on a PlayStation and he was straight on the pace as soon as he did his first lap.
For more information you can go to www.gtacademy.nissan.co.za, www.gran-turismo.com, www.facebook.com/GTAcademy or www.twitter.com/GTAcademy
Happy gaming!
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