Kazunori Yamauchi’s Hot Lap at the Nurburgring

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ateTG5bdoEc

Remember when GT series creator Kazunori Yamauchi joined the Lexus team for the VLN race on the Nurburgring last month? AutoExpress has now also posted a complete on-board lap of the Nordschleife with Yamauchi-san at the wheel! As you can see, he’s a smooth, quick, and calm driver in what appears to be a very balanced and composed IS-F on the infamously bumpy track.

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Comments (56)

  1. newbielives

    I think some are mistaking smooth for granny driving.
    If you ever watch Sebastien Loeb demalish a rally track, it looks pretty boring compared to eg Marcus Gronholm, but in the end who’s faster? The fast boring smooth grandma driver, the racing prodigy Loeb.

  2. Mazda ZXi

    Not only was he short shifting because of the slippery track, he was doing it preserve the transmission. The feature says that they retired with gearbox problems; they would’ve been trying to save the gearbox as much as they could before they retired.

  3. Punknoodle

    @ Ddag – the times he was short shifting were most likely to ensure sufficient grip – the track was damp in places, and coming through a corner in a lower gear with low grip could be a nightmare, hence, short shifting.

    Perhaps he was just shifting 2 or 3 hundred RPM before the shift light was set to come on, the team bosses may have told him not to rev it right out for whatever reason. Maybe they were trying to save the over heating diff…

  4. CaptCalvin

    @rubo

    I thought this was just a hot-lap. If it is indeed a hot-lap, why should he yeild if he wouldn’t get penalised or if he doesn’t see anything particularly dangerous?

  5. ralph89

    People seems to forget that this is an endurance race and not a 2 laps racing that everyone is going flat out, it doesn’t work like that. The other guys said he drives like a granny. :lol:. I wanna see you drive in a same race as he does, and go flat out in a endurance race. I bet you won’t last long, either your transmission will fail or your engine will overheats etc. If not, worst, you’ll crash your car.

  6. 8@No$

    This circuit gives me the creeps, I would be better of in GT than in real life it seems very narrow and dangerous to me, you have to be defensive when driving out there it’s very dangerous no escapes not anything that could mean safety.Well done Kaz, his racing experience means better game guys !
    PS “drive like a granny” whatever you say man, i’d bet he would kick your ass if you raced with him haha

  7. Michael

    Do you know what this means? It means the gut knows what a racing car feels like and he will reflect that on his game, GT5 has the potential to be the best simulation period.

  8. Ddag

    Was he short shifting?
    I dunno if the lights the left of his dash were shift lights, but if they were, he was shifting before they came on a few times, and it didn’t sound like he was ringing it’s neck out for performance. Not that I beasties to be able to do that… Haha

  9. dearlybeloved

    Now that is what i am talking about! I am too excited to watch the whole video because i have to put digital pen to paper. Here we have Gran Turismo’s God ‘playing’ on the green hell just like I have done. I think I will be able to sleep a million times better knowing that not only do we fans have a unique talent behind us but he can drive a race car well and proper. I know that he used to train at a race school but to show me/us fans that he is driving the ‘ring really hits home as to how great Kazanouri Yamauchi is.

    Peace out my people!

  10. rubo

    He might be a good driver, but is it me, or is he overtaking under yellow flag???
    Look at 4:54 and you see a yellow flag, and just after that he overtakes the black car, and it is first in the next corner you see the green flag..

  11. Dom

    He drives like a granny, but I haven’t expected anything else from him. Moreover, it is difficult to risk more if you have no experience, so it’s smart.
    I drove on the Nordschleife twice myself with a regular C6 (Corvette) and a Ford GT. I tried to drive defensivly myself. It simply is very narrow and the cars were pretty fast anyway, so I understand him. Obviously it wouldn’t be very difficult to push harder, and I would have loved to do so, but there is simply no room for error.

  12. Tek9[R]

    What poise! Thank you Kaz for showing how it’s done. I don’t know how good his times were in relation to the leaders, but the smooth ride and “not driveing like a punk” is inspirational…

  13. RADracing

    Not just a Turn 10 employee. It’s got to be the lead developer or at least the physics guy that does the programing.

  14. maxpontiac

    The definitive example of why I trust PD and their physics engine over anything Turn 10 brings to the table.

    Show me a Turn 10 employee turned real world driver competing and winning in a race, and I will acknowledge what they have to say.

    With all the experience that KY has in real world racing, how can anyone doubt PD’s ability to properly bring about an accurate experience?

    If I was Sony, I would use KY and his racing exploits as a marketing campaign for GT5.

  15. jmx2222

    @Zmann42087: Well they start at Nordschleife then they take a turn at the GP Track (don’t know if it’s an full lap) and go back to Nordschleife for a (almost) full lap…that’s what I saw at least

  16. jmx2222

    nice drivin’ KY! Fast’n’clean

    I’m just wondering if in GT5 the same track as in the video will be included (Nordschleife & Gran Prix Track)?

  17. lee

    I log on to this website to gain some more insight into GT5’s progress……but all i seem to get is Yamauchi’s constant world trip around various race tracks for his own pleasure. perhaps he should get back to the office and remember who and what puts money in his pocket.

  18. Jordan

    Thanks for the heads-up regarding the video player issues, guys, it should be fixed now. The problem was only occurring if you tried to play it on the front page.

  19. rofajole

    Jordan, I don’t know if it’s my problem or GTP’s, but the video shown is the GTPSP commercial behind the scenes one. I just thought of letting you know.

  20. ralph89

    This is no surprise, he’s been racing for quite sometimes now. He got a lot of racing experience ever since he was making GT4.

  21. d3br34k5

    This video would be more conveniently served on Youtube. My hTC Touch Pro doesn’t like whatever scripts this other hosting site is trying to run…and why does a video-hosting site need to run a script on my device anyways?

    I personally do not want additional tracking based ads delivered to any of my internet-enabled devices, thanks.

  22. Mike M

    Will-

    The reason you’re seeing the older video (on the front page) is because of your browser cache- reload the screen and it should be okay. And to the start of the lap- this is just his fastest lap from the 40min (or so) he was in the race- the IS-F differential gave in and he had to retire. The actual START/FINISH as with most 24 hr race at the Nurburgring-Nordschleife is probably in the newer Nurburgring GP track and not on the Nordschleife.

  23. IronM@sk

    Aren’t you guys uploading videos to your youtube channel anymore? These videos from giantrealm require you to allow a tracking cookie from vindicosuite as well as a bucketfull of other scripts before you can watch them.

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