CORE Weekly Review: Welcome!
Welcome to the first ever CORE Weekly Review, a community feature that will make an appearance here every week. This feature will take in news relating to Gran Turismo, CORE and even real life motorsports. The feature itself is still very much in the development phase, so if you want to see a particular feature here that you aren’t already seeing, feel free to contact us on the CORE Facebook page.
This week we’ve had exciting racing from the CORE WEC, Blancpain Endurance Series, the Indy 500 and the Monaco Grand Prix, alongside plenty of Gran Turismo news, so we’d better get started!
Senna Content comes to life:
Ever since the Senna content was announced, anticipation was rife throughout the Gran Turismo community. It has now been released free of charge, and features the Lotus F1 Car that has been prominently featured in videos and screenshots, as well as the Formula 3 and Go Kart that were announced recently. The content expands to include 1985 variations of Brands Hatch and Monza, which come as a nice added bonus. However, many were expecting to see Interlagos, and are therefore disappointed. Comment below and voice your opinions on the Senna content.
GT Academy goes to Bathurst!
After Brands Hatch Indy in a Nissan Leaf, and a lap of Apricot Hill in a Nissan 370Z, it was obvious that progression would be the order of the day for the next round of GT Academy. However, a Nissan GTR at Bathurst was not anticipated! The challenging Australian circuit will be one of the toughest challenges ever hosted by GT Academy, and those who manage to get a fast time there on their path to racing stardom should be extremely proud.
Our own TRL_IMMORTAL looks set to be among the favourites this year. After being on top of the timesheets at Apricot Hill, he is fifth (as of Monday 26th of May) at Mount Panorama. Could the WEC competitor end up challenging for a professional race seat at Silverstone? We certainly hope so!
VW Reveals the ‘Vision GTi’, Mitsubishi release their VGT.
After BMW released their Vision Gran Turismo just a couple of weeks ago, Volkswagen have also shown us what their concept will look like. The car is going to be shown to the public at the Woerthersee Festival in Austria on the 28th of May, so it shouldn’t be too far away from our screens on GT6 either.
Meanwhile, Mitsubishi have already launched their Vision Gran Turismo project into the game, the snappily named Mitsubishi Concept XR-PHEV Evolution Vision GT.
How do you feel about these cars? Let us know via Facebook!
CORE WEC:
Ice Cold Racing scored their debut victory in the CORE WEC LMP category at Monza. TexasTyme and Mini Stiggy drove to their maximum in the Audi R18, and defeated Concrete Climax by 47 seconds. Team High Adrenaline Racing came third with Atlantic Alliance Racing fourth, and IMP completing the top five, with TRL_IMMORTAL absent.
GTE was won by Canary Motorsports, who finished almost a minute ahead of TMBO. Mad Dog Racing, Made 4 Racing and Team BMW Motorsport rounded out the top five.
Motorsports:
First to Formula One, and Nico Rosberg once again won the prestigious Monaco Grand Prix. The German driver also qualified on pole. This in itself was the subject of speculation and controversy since many believed that he intentionally out braked himself, bringing out yellow flags that stopped his teammate Lewis Hamilton, who finished second on race day, from challenging for the top grid slot.
The German put in a lights to flag display of domination at the challenging street circuit, while others were halted by errors and attrition. A notable casualty was the reigning champion Sebastian Vettel, who lasted less than five laps before electrical woes halted his challenge. Kimi Raikkonen, Pastor Maldonado, Adrian Sutil and Kevin Magnussen, as well as many others, all retired or lost time during the race for various different reasons. One man to benefit from this was Jules Bianchi, who finished 9th, giving Marussia their first points since entering F1 in 2010 (as Virgin).
Over to the Blancpain Endurance Series, and following a promising debut at the opening round at Monza, M-Sport secured their first victory with the new Bentley Continental GT3. The winning car was piloted by Steven Kane, Andy Meyrick and friend of CORE Guy Smith, who showed that the Bentley was a winning package over three hours at Silverstone.
The day also marked a brilliant result for GT Academy graduates Nick McMillen and Florian Strauss, who finished eighth overall and topped the Pro-Am category alongside RJN team regular Alex Buncombe.
Ryan Hunter-Reay won the Indianapolis 500 following an epic duel with Helio Castroneves, who finished second. The margin of victory, 0.0600 seconds, was the second closest in the long history of the event. As always, many guest drivers appeared in the race. Notably, NASCAR star Kurt Busch came home sixth, while 1997 Formula One World Champion Jacques Villeneuve came home in fifteenth.
The day was not over for Busch, who then travelled to Charlotte to compete in the NASCAR Sprint Cup event. Unfortunately, his second race of the day did not go to plan, as an engine failure in his Chevrolet stopped his progress after an extraordinary 906 miles of racing in one day. Jimmie Johnson won the race after an exciting race, with Matt Kenseth and Kevin Harvick trying to take the victory away all race long.
Elsewhere, the new World Rallycross series returned to the spiritual home of the sport, Lydden Hill in Kent. With a huge number of entries, and the likes of BTCC Champion Andrew Jordan, 2003 World Rally Champion Petter Solberg and Tanner Foust all advancing to the final, the fans were definitely in for a treat. And that is exactly what they got. After a spectacular race, it was Andreas Bakkerud and Andrew Jordan who came first and third respectively in Ford Fiestas, while Robin Larsson came home second in an Audi A1.
In Austria, the drivers of the World Touring Car Championship drivers found themselves even further behind Jose Maria Lopez of Citroen, who now has a 41 point lead in the championship following a victory in race two. The day initially looked to be all about Yvan Muller, who won in race one. However, the Frenchman was involved in a large accident on the first lap that also claimed the scalps of Rob Huff and James Thompson. Gabriele Tarquini (Honda) came home second in race two, while WRC legend Sebastien Loeb came home seventh following a fourth place finish in race one.
CORE Car of The Week:
After a week of brilliant nominations, Jonnyb1990’s McLaren F1 proved to be the most popular CORE Car of The Day. Thanks to this, the car now also has the prestigious honour of being the CORE Car of The Week!
If you have a nomination, don’t hesitate to contact us on the CORE Facebook page! A brief summary of why you chose it is required, and pictures would be nice where possible. Don’t forget, it must be a car from your GT6 garage!
Closing Thoughts:
This feature was delayed this week to allow the WEC Final Results to be included. As a rule, Tuesday will be the main posting day for the Weekly Review, but on WEC weeks there might be delays as the results are key components for this feature.
So a week of exciting developments in the world of Gran Turismo, and a brilliant week of racing in the CORE WEC. The Monaco Grand Prix and the Indy 500 last weekend only added to it. Unfortunately, all this was overshadowed by the loss of Psychoperra1192. On Thursday evening we held a tribute parade in her honour. This parade will feature in the WEC race highlights, and a photo gallery is up on the CORE Facebook page.
Thank you for reading the first ever CORE Weekly Review.
Dedicated to Psychoperra1192. R.I.P
