44 replies to this topic

[F1ultimate]

This is pretty fun and enlightening news for racing fans and gamers alike. 

 

http://www.walesonli...gh-step-6714919

 

 

Edited by F1ultimate, 17 February 2014 - 11:55.

[darkkis]

And a link to the article: http://www1.skysport...-in-gp3-in-2014

[TimRTC]

Congratulations, finally a driver who cannot be called a 'pay driver' getting into the GP formulae.

[Prost1997T]

They also have Alex Lynn in GP3 this year, I think RB will only keep the one with the better results after this season.

[Brandz07]

He hasn't signed for the actual Junior Team though, right? I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere, just that he's under contract to 'Red Bull Racing'.

 

It looks to me like Nissan have used their Infiniti links to get him some sim time..

 

 

Edit: Apparently it's stated in their press released that he will be..

Edited by Brandz07, 17 February 2014 - 14:04.

[HaydenFan]

Motorsport is all about who you know. He put in very good results for his first year year of single seater racing (running F3 none less). On top of that, he took second in the Toyota Racing Series down in New Zealand this winter. Well deserved. 

[st99]

He hasn't signed for the actual Junior Team though, right? I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere, just that he's under contract to 'Red Bull Racing'.

 

It looks to me like Nissan have used their Infiniti links to get him some sim time..

 

 

Edit: Apparently it's stated in their press released that he will be.

 

He's in the Red Bull Racing driver development program not on the actual RB Junior Team.

 

 

Mardenborough's development programme should not be confused with the Red Bull young driver programme which has brought Sebastian Vettel, Daniel Ricciardo, Jean-Eric Vergne and Daniil Kvyat in recent years into F1, but the Briton is hoping he can impress enough that he could be considered for a Toro Rosso seat in the future.

[JHSingo]

Talk about jumping on the bandwagon, Red Bull...

[eronrules]

first step in committing career suicide .... like all the other Red Bull backed drivers that we don't remember

[ZionLH]

Wow what a story , good luck for the future Jann 

[Ross Stonefeld]

first step in committing career suicide .... like all the other Red Bull backed drivers that we don't remember

 

This is one of the biggest myths of the forum. Where would they be had they not gone with Red Bull? 

 

Completely unknown.

[ZionLH]

[Imateria]

This is one of the biggest myths of the forum. Where would they be had they not gone with Red Bull? 

 

Completely unknown.

Not just this forum. RB might ruthlessly sack under performing drivers but those drivers wouldn't have a drive without RB in the first place.

[eronrules]

This is one of the biggest myths of the forum. Where would they be had they not gone with Red Bull? 

 

Completely unknown.

the problem is, those drivers who aren't supported by Red Bull can do well with sponsor changes. but when red bull let's go of a driver, he/she usually never recovers that loss, as being dropped by Red Bull is seen as a bigger strike mark than loosing some unknown sponsors

 

that's what i've seen happen to majority of drivers who were dropped by Red Bull junior program. that's why Felipe Nasr declined to join Red Bull junior program. 

[dau]

the problem is, those drivers who aren't supported by Red Bull can do well with sponsor changes. but when red bull let's go of a driver, he/she usually never recovers that loss, as being dropped by Red Bull is seen as a bigger strike mark than loosing some unknown sponsors

 

that's what i've seen happen to majority of drivers who were dropped by Red Bull junior program. that's why Felipe Nasr declined to join Red Bull junior program. 

 

Really? So where exactly are all those talented non-RB drivers that did well with sponsor changes? Where's Calado? Where's Frijns? Why are there constant complaints that only paydrivers make it to F1 nowadays, why are there basically only rich kids winning in GP2? 

 

RB drivers never recover? About half of them have a decent career in sportscars by now. Where do you think a Buemi would have ended up without Red Bull? As for that other half, well, maybe they really weren't that good in the first place and they ended up pretty much where they would have without Red Bull? Where exactly is that driver whose career was 'ruined' by Red Bull? Mika Maki? Scott Speed? DJ Squire?

[sneaker91]

Way cool

 

I wish him well as I always felt that the thought processing that goes behind being good in a simulator/gaming applies to the real world.

 

He's obviously not  fat/wimpy which is the downfall of many a geek/gamer trying to prove it in the real world.

[rhukkas]

Career suicide. 3 years ago he was a complete nobody playing Gran Turismo in his bedroom. Now he has Nissan backing and part of a redBull development program. Yep... that's career suicide

 

hahahahaahahah

 

 

hahahahahahahaha

 

 

HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAH

[chunder27]

If anyone has seen or tried to do what you have to do to get anywhere near the top times in the game, you will know that nearly everyone who plays and sets a time in top few hundred could do this to. I play sim games a lot and couldn't get anywhere near these guys, seconds away. Does that mean I would be seconds away in real life, maybe, but I think not. Perception and how you digest info coming to you is not the same as driving skills and feel.

 

The bloke has had tens of thousands spent on him by two massive companies to get him where he is, just like the other guy was it Ordonez.

 

I think given the same chances, a hell of a lot of people could do exactly the same if they have the same level of dedicaiton to training, that's the key, we all have driving ability and talent, a game proves little other than how you actually have to get to the times needed, it's all about cutting, working out where the programmer has left little areas for you to cut, and twitch response, which has little to do with driving. Can you imagine the hours and thousands of restarts he did to get the quicker times, he would know within seconds of the first bend and quit if he was behind ghost. That takes a certain amount of dedication for starters! I know, I have tried.

 

I will say it here too, the fact he is black certainy helps his situation, will certainly not do promotion any harm, and is a huge thing in any kind of promotion liek this these days for these huge corporations, like the ones he is working with now. If he is the best candidate and is black it's a win win for everyone. Like Lewis, Bubba etc.

 

These competitions open the door to lots of new people which is cool, but like most racing in these areas, it is contrived. I think thousands of guys given the chance could be as good as him, he just happened to be good at a game. But fair play to him, I hope he does well.

[billm99uk]

Go Jan! Be nice to have an F1 driver from Wales for once...

 

Pointless trivia fact: His dad Steve is mainly famous for scoring his only league goal for Wolves against Liverpool in 1984

[F1ultimate]

If anyone has seen or tried to do what you have to do to get anywhere near the top times in the game, you will know that nearly everyone who plays and sets a time in top few hundred could do this to. I play sim games a lot and couldn't get anywhere near these guys, seconds away. Does that mean I would be seconds away in real life, maybe, but I think not. Perception and how you digest info coming to you is not the same as driving skills and feel.

 

The bloke has had tens of thousands spent on him by two massive companies to get him where he is, just like the other guy was it Ordonez.

 

I think given the same chances, a hell of a lot of people could do exactly the same if they have the same level of dedicaiton to training, that's the key, we all have driving ability and talent, a game proves little other than how you actually have to get to the times needed, it's all about cutting, working out where the programmer has left little areas for you to cut, and twitch response, which has little to do with driving. Can you imagine the hours and thousands of restarts he did to get the quicker times, he would know within seconds of the first bend and quit if he was behind ghost. That takes a certain amount of dedication for starters! I know, I have tried.

 

I will say it here too, the fact he is black certainy helps his situation, will certainly not do promotion any harm, and is a huge thing in any kind of promotion liek this these days for these huge corporations, like the ones he is working with now. If he is the best candidate and is black it's a win win for everyone. Like Lewis, Bubba etc.

 

These competitions open the door to lots of new people which is cool, but like most racing in these areas, it is contrived. I think thousands of guys given the chance could be as good as him, he just happened to be good at a game. But fair play to him, I hope he does well.

 

Isn't that exactly what Nissan and Playstation has done. He's beat the masses in a very democratic process and has continued to impress. Give the guy some credit.

[Andrew Hope]

This is one of the biggest myths of the forum. Where would they be had they not gone with Red Bull? 

 

Completely unknown.

 

Yep. It's like if a company gave you $1,000,000 to invest and if you hadn't turned it into $2,000,000 after 5 years they took half the money you have back, but when they do everyone says "See! They just steal you money!".

[HaydenFan]

Go Jan! Be nice to have an F1 driver from Wales for once...

 

Pointless trivia fact: His dad Steve is mainly famous for scoring his only league goal for Wolves against Liverpool in 1984

 

Father was a footballer? Huh, Wonder how much that has actually helped his race career?

 

As for the Red Bull driver curse thing: Maybe Red Bull sucks at talent scouting? Strike gold with Vettel, but realistically everyone else is pretty interchangeable. I mean, how many Red Bull backed drivers win titles past Formula Renault? You had the stretch of Carlin/Red Bull kids destroying Brit. F3 and the F2 champ in '09 (Bortolini or something like that). But none have panned out. And it isn't like they are given bad cars either. On a few occasions, some RB Junior team drivers have gotten stuck in crap car, but most are in the best equipment on the grid. 

[SR388]

I will be watching his progress with great interest. 

[Longtimefan]

I wish him good luck!

[Juan Kerr]

If anyone has seen or tried to do what you have to do to get anywhere near the top times in the game, you will know that nearly everyone who plays and sets a time in top few hundred could do this to. I play sim games a lot and couldn't get anywhere near these guys, seconds away. Does that mean I would be seconds away in real life, maybe, but I think not. Perception and how you digest info coming to you is not the same as driving skills and feel.

 

The bloke has had tens of thousands spent on him by two massive companies to get him where he is, just like the other guy was it Ordonez.

 

I think given the same chances, a hell of a lot of people could do exactly the same if they have the same level of dedicaiton to training, that's the key, we all have driving ability and talent, a game proves little other than how you actually have to get to the times needed, it's all about cutting, working out where the programmer has left little areas for you to cut, and twitch response, which has little to do with driving. Can you imagine the hours and thousands of restarts he did to get the quicker times, he would know within seconds of the first bend and quit if he was behind ghost. That takes a certain amount of dedication for starters! I know, I have tried.

 

I will say it here too, the fact he is black certainy helps his situation, will certainly not do promotion any harm, and is a huge thing in any kind of promotion liek this these days for these huge corporations, like the ones he is working with now. If he is the best candidate and is black it's a win win for everyone. Like Lewis, Bubba etc.

 

These competitions open the door to lots of new people which is cool, but like most racing in these areas, it is contrived. I think thousands of guys given the chance could be as good as him, he just happened to be good at a game. But fair play to him, I hope he does well.

Its not actually what any of you think, I was actually there and got there by being miles faster than Jann with a lot less effort but the whole thing was a marketing PR event right from the moment they realised they'd had a young fit marketable teenager on board. He tried and tried and tried to qualify and didn't even make the top ten but suddenly when it came to the finals his path was made very easy. Anything that was subjective was an automatic given and even when he got to the world finals there were cries of 'foul' when he was allowed to not take part in a body destroying physical assault course.
Hey I don't wanna beat up on him because it wasn't his fault and I also now believe that this was the perfect person to 'select' from this program, he is young he is marketable and he was in relatively good shape but what you see on the surface as always is not what really is the case. I really really hope he gets to F1 but there were more talented potential racing drivers that came out of that program than him and they were from other countries around the world too.
One thing I have to say though is no matter how many negative things going on under the surface of this program Jann has got one very very useful characteristic much more important than understanding the physics of moving objects is his calm calm personality. If he ever gets to F1 this lad will probably win if he has the speed. He's got a Kimi Raikkonen personality, difficult to excite and always on-a-level. Its not really a psychological thing its more of an emotional thing, his emotions are very limited which is a great hallmark for an F1 driver.That was a massive competition and he certainly stepped up and put himself forward and was more than ready to be recognised as an out-an-out winner on whatever level. So yes I had my dig at this event overall but Jann can go quite far in motorsport especially at his age.

[Imateria]

^Thats quite interesting and even surprising because in actual competition he's proved very capable. At Le Mans last year he was arguably the fastest of Greaves 3 drivers, with Ordonaz and Michael Krumm being the other and Krumm in particular is quite fast.

[Farhannn15]

Father was a footballer? Huh, Wonder how much that has actually helped his race career?

 

As for the Red Bull driver curse thing: Maybe Red Bull sucks at talent scouting? Strike gold with Vettel, but realistically everyone else is pretty interchangeable. I mean, how many Red Bull backed drivers win titles past Formula Renault? You had the stretch of Carlin/Red Bull kids destroying Brit. F3 and the F2 champ in '09 (Bortolini or something like that). But none have panned out. And it isn't like they are given bad cars either. On a few occasions, some RB Junior team drivers have gotten stuck in crap car, but most are in the best equipment on the grid. 

Not a lot in terms of funding, here's an extract from his Wikipedia page. Unlike most racing drivers Mardenborough has no longtime karting experience. At the age of eight he began kart racing in his hometown Cardiff. When he was eleven years old the local track was closed. His family did not have the budget to continue his racing career, so he had to stop competing in karts. The costs of karting are extremely high nowadays, you can expect to spend 40k or more on a season. It's a rich man's world

[HaydenFan]

Not a lot in terms of funding, here's an extract from his Wikipedia page. Unlike most racing drivers Mardenborough has no longtime karting experience. At the age of eight he began kart racing in his hometown Cardiff. When he was eleven years old the local track was closed. His family did not have the budget to continue his racing career, so he had to stop competing in karts. The costs of karting are extremely high nowadays, you can expect to spend 40k or more on a season. It's a rich man's world

 

I mean from a connections side. While we saw with Superleague Formula, football and motorsport don't exactly fit together. But many companies which sponsor football clubs have sponsored racing teams Not sure how big of a player his father was in the sport, but any foot in the door is better than what the average person would have. And like Juan said, he wasn't necessarily the fastest of the drivers in the competition. Was having an even semi-famous father a help? 

[Juan Kerr]

I mean from a connections side. While we saw with Superleague Formula, football and motorsport don't exactly fit together. But many companies which sponsor football clubs have sponsored racing teams Not sure how big of a player his father was in the sport, but any foot in the door is better than what the average person would have. And like Juan said, he wasn't necessarily the fastest of the drivers in the competition. Was having an even semi-famous father a help? 

No it wasn't his father it was purely and simply the organisers were absolutely desperate to have a young kid to send forward to F1 levels out of the game and he was perfect. It was frustrating at the time for all the other competitors, I can't give too much away let's say it wasn't frustrating for me as I was there for a different reason which I can't divulge. 
Please don't get me wrong though, Jann is definitely the man to send forward and back 100%. Its just I always knew they were getting close to reality with the actually physics of driving and the skills needed for very high levels and I wanted to see the biggest talent from the game win, admittedly though that would've led to nothing as the best guys that I encountered weren't right to go all the way purely on age alone. There's super quick guys that can get to extremely speed over time there's guys not that fast but quick up to good speed and they only ever gave you 3 laps on a weird rig that may have suited some more than others. Poorly run and I hope they change all that if it carries on. Jann was very fast up to his speed, not super-quick but quicker than most to get there in the limited laps allowed
Take it from me though we ought to support Jann, I certainly have done once I detached him from the Academy in my mind and thought of him as his own man. He's got backing but he's sat in those cars on his own now I only hope he is adaptable enough to change his driving style with such little experience. His mind is perfect, he's got that psychopathic calm that you need. He is completely un-distractable.

[handel]

It's a shame you can't go into more detail. Always interesting to see behind the curtain and it sounds like you have some interesting observations about the event - weird that they can keep it so hidden if that's 'strangely' organised.

[olliek88]

It is a shame you can't go into more detail... 

 

 

Or not.

[Juan Kerr]

It's a shame you can't go into more detail. Always interesting to see behind the curtain and it sounds like you have some interesting observations about the event - weird that they can keep it so hidden if that's 'strangely' organised.

It wasn't 'organised', no-one conspired to get Jann through there was just a standout obvious desire to get him through and through the world final especially since he would never have had another chance, once you fail you aren't allowed to try again you see. There was just some little things that made a big difference like no matter what he did he would not have got penalised, you know the subjective ambiguous things. He was the perfect answer to the competition so he was always gonna get first in the media for example even though he was pretty quiet. There was a few mistakes that helped him a lot, I remember some guy protested that he should've not been given pole for one of the races because he didn't have the fastest lap prior and subsequently didn't have much speed so the 2nd place guy was climbing all over the back of him for 2 laps. if this other guy had dared to send one down the inside we all knew he would've been penalised. That kinda thing.

In the world finals he was allowed to miss the whole countryside physical drill which was horrendous and killed everyone whilst Jann sat it out with a small injury. Like I said, not his fault but they were soo desperate to get a British winner (in their words) and this young kid comes along with the Lewis Hamilton theme and they drooled at the prospect. Afterall it was only a marketing campaign hence why lots of technical problems and very short races etc that didn't allow people to show their talent was just brushed aside and forgotten about. It really didn't matter who was there to them they just wanted a 'Jann'
It's OK though I've decided it will be great to support him now because they got the best guy but if you have a purist opinion it was very distasteful. All sorts of failed racing drivers now are looking to use the Academy as a second chance springboard, so this is now the come-uppance, technically they'll now never get what Yamauchi wanted. Competitors need money and experience now just as normal in the real world and all the other GT Academy winner will disappear. The only thing that bothers me is how hard Jann found it to qualify originally since he played the time trial non-stop for so long, this is my worry regarding F1, You would'vt wanted to have sees him do better with that but as I said his personality is 100% perfect. If he clicks with his finesse he'll be amazing.

[Ross Stonefeld]

If he was the best guy, how was he pushed through.

 

And if you can only do it once, how are you a Multiple GT Academy National Finalist 

[rhukkas]

 

Not a lot in terms of funding, here's an extract from his Wikipedia page. Unlike most racing drivers Mardenborough has no longtime karting experience. At the age of eight he began kart racing in his hometown Cardiff. When he was eleven years old the local track was closed. His family did not have the budget to continue his racing career, so he had to stop competing in karts. The costs of karting are extremely high nowadays, you can expect to spend 40k or more on a season. It's a rich man's world

 

40k a SEASON? haha if ya lucky. KF-J (12-15yr) start at 250k.

Edited by rhukkas, 19 February 2014 - 00:52.

[rhukkas]

Its not actually what any of you think, I was actually there and got there by being miles faster than Jann with a lot less effort but the whole thing was a marketing PR event right from the moment they realised they'd had a young fit marketable teenager on board. He tried and tried and tried to qualify and didn't even make the top ten but suddenly when it came to the finals his path was made very easy. Anything that was subjective was an automatic given and even when he got to the world finals there were cries of 'foul' when he was allowed to not take part in a body destroying physical assault course.
Hey I don't wanna beat up on him because it wasn't his fault and I also now believe that this was the perfect person to 'select' from this program, he is young he is marketable and he was in relatively good shape but what you see on the surface as always is not what really is the case. I really really hope he gets to F1 but there were more talented potential racing drivers that came out of that program than him and they were from other countries around the world too.
One thing I have to say though is no matter how many negative things going on under the surface of this program Jann has got one very very useful characteristic much more important than understanding the physics of moving objects is his calm calm personality. If he ever gets to F1 this lad will probably win if he has the speed. He's got a Kimi Raikkonen personality, difficult to excite and always on-a-level. Its not really a psychological thing its more of an emotional thing, his emotions are very limited which is a great hallmark for an F1 driver.That was a massive competition and he certainly stepped up and put himself forward and was more than ready to be recognised as an out-an-out winner on whatever level. So yes I had my dig at this event overall but Jann can go quite far in motorsport especially at his age.

 

I've bolded these two sentences because I need to question something - you are saying that the other guys were more capable of winning in F1 than Jann. You suggest that you feel Jann is good enough to win in F1, so by default the others guys who were more talented had a greater ability in F1.

 

Also, with the investment involved I suggest they probably saw Jann, recognised early on he was the real deal, and that was that.

 

Maybe if any of you were man enough (woman enough for equality) you should have stood up, left the show and made a point. Not whine on a forum a few years later. MAKE A STAND, show you have the desire to reach the top and not be screwed over. Instead you all showed the qualities of drivers who haven't got what it takes.

Edited by rhukkas, 19 February 2014 - 00:58.

[Ross Stonefeld]

Yeah, I'm sure they would have run after him with a contract when he walked. So impressed they were with his balls.

[Fondmetal]

His face fitted with what Nissan had in mind and he got lucky. Many kids would jump at the chance if presented, cannot blame him but the system is flawed. Bit like drivers like Di Resta being out in the cold and the grid packed with pay drivers.

[Juan Kerr]

I've bolded these two sentences because I need to question something - you are saying that the other guys were more capable of winning in F1 than Jann. You suggest that you feel Jann is good enough to win in F1, so by default the others guys who were more talented had a greater ability in F1.

 

Also, with the investment involved I suggest they probably saw Jann, recognised early on he was the real deal, and that was that.

 

Maybe if any of you were man enough (woman enough for equality) you should have stood up, left the show and made a point. Not whine on a forum a few years later. MAKE A STAND, show you have the desire to reach the top and not be screwed over. Instead you all showed the qualities of drivers who haven't got what it takes.

Not everyone is a political activist, he himself wouldn't do that either. Hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it? If you stand up and leave they just watch you walk out and the very thing that you're doing happens, people just say its just sour grapes, you can't convince them unless they have the same understanding of the situation, they'd have to also be able to understand the intricacies of the game and how it works and the massive difference a couple of subtle things can make. Also when you first spot things you cannot jump to conclusions. 

[chunder27]

Doesn't surprise me at all, is typical of a big corporation to do something like this. I feel sorry for the lad in the thread, sounds hard done by, and must be very galling for people who were quicker than him. Actually as someone said, go public, sod it, if they have pushed someone through who really didnt make the grade but hit a Nissan/Sony/RB profile, tell them.  What have you got to lose?

 

Let's remember the Gran Turismo series is a giant money making machine for Sony, the game is really changed remarkably little and they even have the temerity to call it new every few years, when all they are really doing is a giant patch! Let's face it GT6 is basically a patched version of 5 which still inclided PS2 graphics on the vast majority of cars.

 

So they know how to make money, as do Red Bull, Nissan and the various others.

 

Bear in mind from a news point of view, a news corporation will eat this stuff all day, gamer turns to pro driver.  Iracing did it years ago with Huttu and he was superb, but sick as a dog when he drive the car bless him!  And he was the ultimate alien, still is more than likely! IMagine them doing it with COD! 

 

I have always believed the Academy thing to be a huge con, I play racing games a lot and can compete online on a PC with most, am never the fastest but usually top 10 and maybe a second to 1.5 away from leaders times.  On Iracing sometimes was very close, but it is their consistency and ability to do it time after time that counts. But when you go into this and do a few hours and find you are 4 seconds slower, you realise there is something afoot, something serious.

 

Academy initially is based purely on laptime and that means knowing where to cut, knowing where you can legally cheat and literally spending day after day chipping tenths and hundredths off your time. Is not at all relative, just painstaking. By the end I would expect you know every pixel of the track, you know within 10 seconds and one corner if it is worth carrying on with the lap, each corner is a simple maths experiment, am I up or down, if down quit. It is more about uinderstanding how the programmer wants you to drive than based on any real driving knowledge or experience.

[RoutariEnjinu]

 

Who plays racing games with a wheel and an external view? Was this just done at the request of the media students filming him, or did he compete in GT Academy the same way?

[noikeee]

Academy initially is based purely on laptime and that means knowing where to cut, knowing where you can legally cheat and literally spending day after day chipping tenths and hundredths off your time. Is not at all relative, just painstaking. By the end I would expect you know every pixel of the track, you know within 10 seconds and one corner if it is worth carrying on with the lap, each corner is a simple maths experiment, am I up or down, if down quit. It is more about uinderstanding how the programmer wants you to drive than based on any real driving knowledge or experience.

 

I don't agree, okay hotlapping with unlimited practice does need a different skillset than racing others, but ultimately everyone reaches their own plateau, if you do not have the talent to be in the ballpark of quick laptimes, a million laps of practice won't win you the GT Academy. My experience with iRacing is that you get better with practice yes, but I sure as hell know if I spend the next 10 years practicing on the same car and track I'm never gonna put an overall pole laptime. If you don't naturally have smooth feet, practice isn't gonna give you smooth feet. It might give you the last 5 tenths but you need to have natural talent to be within 5 tenths anyway.

 

By the way I'm not actually that impressed by Mardenborough in single-seaters yet. Don't get me wrong there has to be a good reason he was the only one picked to go the F1 route. And drivers who have gone on to good things have similarly struggled in their rookie F3 seasons - that's drivers with the massive advantage of having done karting since the age of 5 or 6. But he's got a long way to improve to F1-standards from what he did in F3 this season. Benefit of the doubt is on his side, he deserves time sure, more than others who don't have his handicap, but results aren't exactly indicating "new Vettel" yet. Let's wait a bit before going all "woah great driver" on him.

[noikeee]

Also a bit OT but I'm sure relevant in some way - Juan Kerr (lol) can you give us some insight on Miguel Faísca the guy from Portugal who won this year? Or you don't know him?

 

From what we saw on telly (edited to their benefit of course) it looked like he actually wasn't as quick as many others throughout the competition, but delivered and impressed the judges at the right time. That looked a little off to me after all the accusations of bias I read on the internet (not just you - I've read similar things in other places) - sure they did not pick the outright quickest guy, but why would they have bias towards a Portuguese guy, it's not exactly the biggest market out there for them.

[billm99uk]

I wasn't awesomely impressed with his F3 results so far. They were good, but not "obvious F1" driver level good. But as he hasn't come through karting, you wonder how much he has to learn in comparison to his competitors. Must have learnt something though - he was mostly just inside the top 10 in last year's TRS and was a real contender this year.

[Juan Kerr]

Doesn't surprise me at all, is typical of a big corporation to do something like this. I feel sorry for the lad in the thread, sounds hard done by, and must be very galling for people who were quicker than him. Actually as someone said, go public, sod it, if they have pushed someone through who really didnt make the grade but hit a Nissan/Sony/RB profile, tell them.  What have you got to lose?

 

Let's remember the Gran Turismo series is a giant money making machine for Sony, the game is really changed remarkably little and they even have the temerity to call it new every few years, when all they are really doing is a giant patch! Let's face it GT6 is basically a patched version of 5 which still inclided PS2 graphics on the vast majority of cars.

 

So they know how to make money, as do Red Bull, Nissan and the various others.

 

Bear in mind from a news point of view, a news corporation will eat this stuff all day, gamer turns to pro driver.  Iracing did it years ago with Huttu and he was superb, but sick as a dog when he drive the car bless him!  And he was the ultimate alien, still is more than likely! IMagine them doing it with COD! 

 

I have always believed the Academy thing to be a huge con, I play racing games a lot and can compete online on a PC with most, am never the fastest but usually top 10 and maybe a second to 1.5 away from leaders times.  On Iracing sometimes was very close, but it is their consistency and ability to do it time after time that counts. But when you go into this and do a few hours and find you are 4 seconds slower, you realise there is something afoot, something serious.

 

Academy initially is based purely on laptime and that means knowing where to cut, knowing where you can legally cheat and literally spending day after day chipping tenths and hundredths off your time. Is not at all relative, just painstaking. By the end I would expect you know every pixel of the track, you know within 10 seconds and one corner if it is worth carrying on with the lap, each corner is a simple maths experiment, am I up or down, if down quit. It is more about uinderstanding how the programmer wants you to drive than based on any real driving knowledge or experience.

No no you 'got'd da wrong' as Ayrton Senna would say I would never have been eligible so it was even easier to take a balanced view of what was going on, it was me that felt sorry for some of the other lads that I got to know around the world that had a lot more natural talent. The organisers way of picking someone to go into the reality racing world was very primitive and PR based whereas what I learnt from being integrated into that world for a few years was priceless in comparison, the candidates that I would've put through or the competition that I would've come up with and many others also that were as much into and succesful at the game could've contributed and found a much better system of finding the right age guy with the right PR skills and most importantly ultimate deft of touch and sensitivity instead of someone who wasn't top ten. My comments are absolutely not about me, zero percent even though I occasionally use my level as a reference, it is just that...a reference.
Gran Turismo is so so real they had a marvelous tool to find driving talent but they blew it by commissioning a load of ignorant morons to think up a format and let their preconceptions get the better of them.

[chunder27]

Please believe me

 

GT is not at all real!

 

Iracing kicks it into the weeds, and that comes from real racers who I have spoken to on tracks that theya re racing on week on week that are also on Iracing, they use it to get dialled in.

 

And also, most F1 teams use versions (admittedly heavily modded ones) of Rfactor, old hat now, but one of the best game engines ever made for sims.