GT Academy: Silverstone, Here We Come!

The time has come! We are now a little more than a week away from crowning the first winner of GT Academy here in the US. This weekend, the nation’s top 16 Gran Turismo 5 players will be making their way across the ocean to participate in the final phase of GT Academy, an intense week-long racing camp to be held at the Silverstone Circuit in the U.K. Participants will be judged by an expert panel of racing veterans, judging each competitor’s performance behind the wheel of real Nissan race cars, as well as through other grueling challenges designed to push their physical and mental stamina to the limits. The person who is judged to have the most natural talent and potential to succeed as a professional race car driver will be crowned the first GT Academy champion in the US.

Watch a recap of what went down in March at the National Finals event, where the nation’s top 32 GT5 players, who made it through a field of over 53,000 entrants, faced off to determine which 16 would make the trip to Silverstone to compete in real cars for a shot at being GT Academy champion.

The GT Academy champion will go on to train with elite race coaches and drivers before competing as part of a professional racing team. If the champion truly has what it takes, he will go on to take part in major international races like the 24 Hours of Le Mans, just like the first European GT Academy winner, Lucas Ordonez, who will race at Le Mans in a few weeks. In just three short years, Lucas has gone from grad student to making his first appearance on Le Mans… and the US GT Academy champion could be joining him there in a few years!

Congratulations from Sony, Polyphony Digital and Nissan North America to these truly amazing 16 individuals. We wish them all good luck.

The top 16, in no particular order:

Bryan Heitkotter, Christopher Roberts, Jason Miller, Andre Gomes, John Wilding, Christopher Morton, Kris Norris, Gregory Russell, Connor Clifford, Phillip Arscott, Nick Fontana, Rich Pratt, Glenn McGee Howle, Steve Driscoll, Sean Johnston, Jose Cedeno

Join us on Facebook to stay up to date with the latest news and happenings direct from Silverstone next week, and watch for the GT Academy reality show to debut on the Speed Channel this fall.