GTPlanet

The Goodwood Festival of Speed is something that’s almost too good to be true – it’s the world’s largest gathering of the mostexotic, rare, and desirable cars you can imagine, and it takes place every summer in the beautiful English countryside.  Of course, it always attracts some of the biggest stars from motorsports, but Kazunori Yamauchi, GT Academy winner Lucas Ordonez, and the Citroen GT made this year’s show all the more special for GTPlanet members in attendance.

Yamauchi was particularly busy, spotted filming lots of material for what is assumed to be Gran Turismo TV.  He slipped behind the wheel of a 1966 Jaguar XJ13 – the only one ever produced, with an estimated value of $11 million (feel free to speculate about its inclusion in GT5).  He also sat down with F1 drivers David Coulthard and Mark Webber as “part of a documentary he’s making,” according to Red Bull Racing.  Lucas also got in on the action, hanging out with Yamauchi at the show and meeting current Formula 1 Championship points leader Jenson Button.  He also got the chance to drive the famous Goodwood Hillclimb himself, piloting a new Nissan 370Z.

A big thanks to RetroGlide for sharing these excellent pictures from the event with us!  Take a look at our full gallery after the jump for more…

UPDATE: Just added a new batch of photos TVR&Ferrari_Fan. Check out his full gallery on DeviantArt for even more!

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Polyphony Digital’s Citroën GT is set to become one of the most expensive “production cars” (if you can really call it that…) sold today, coming in at £1.1 million pounds or approximately $1.8 million U.S. dollars.  AutoCar got the scoop from “senior inside sources”, who revealed that only six of the cars will be made -- all of which will be powered by either a “Ford or GM V8″.  That’s considerably less than the 20 production models that were hinted at before, but according to AutoCar, “most of the concept’s features should make the final production version, including the carbon-fibre construction and eccentric interior details such as the copper trim.”  Sweet!  The final production version of the car is expected to be launched at the Frankfurt Motor Show this September.

While you’re saving up, check out this video showing the GT’s recent tour around London.

Polyphony Digital’s Citroen GT concept car has been busier than ever – first appearing at the 24 Hours of the Nurburgring, hitting up the 24 Hours of Le Mans a few weeks ago, and now stopping traffic as it drives the London street circuit from GT5 Prologue.  Of course, this made for some pretty impressive photo ops, which you can see below.  The car is slowly making its way to the Goodwood Festival of Speed, taking place July 3-5.  Full press release after the jump…

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The Gran Turismo brand once again made a strong showing last weekend at the legendary 24 Hours of Le Mans.  Trackside banners could be seen all around Circuit de La Sarthe – most notably at the chicanes down the  Mulsanne straight.  Sony also continued their strong support of the Pescarolo Sport racing team’s Peugeot 908 LMP car, in the quickly-becoming-classic light blue/green/white livery that you probably remember from GT4.  Polyphony Digital’s Citroen GT also made the rounds this year, (supposedly) doing a honorary lap around the circuit (still waiting on pictures of that) and appearing in a local driver’s parade.

(Photo by Brecht Decancq.  Thanks to DaveTheStalker for the Mulsanne screen grab, too.)

Citroen continues to promote their popular Citroen GT with increasingly high-profile events.  Just last weekend, Polyphony Digital’s real-life concept car helped kick off the infamous 24 Hours of the Nurburgring, and was on public display during the entire event.  This is the first of several appearances for the car across Europe – coming up next, it will take part in the driver’s parade of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, and will attend the UK’s Goodwood Festival of Speed in July.

It should also be noted that the Gran Turismo brand was featured prominently at the Nurburgring, on the windshield of each car.  Photos/videos of the Citroen GT on the Nordschleife have yet to pop up, though it’s only a matter of time…

If you’re a regular GTPlanet visitor, you already know about the Citroen GT.  It’s a monumental and unique achievement for a video game production company – the one and only Polyphony Digital.  However, you may be surprised to learn how many “real world” projects the Gran Turismo master minds are responsible for.  Tucked away on their Japanese website is a fascinating timeline of  collaborative projects, from the Nissan GT-R concept in 2001 to the Citroen GT today.

One of their more interesting yet little-known design tasks involved Team Impul’s open-wheeled race car, which competed in the Formula Nippon racing series.  The timeline also provides an extensive list of every “special edition” version of Gran Turismo ever created, most of which even die-hard fans of the series have probably never heard of.  For example, did you know a special “training version” of the game was created just for drivers in Volkswagen’s ADAC Lupo Cup racing series?  I didn’t think so.  Learn more from the  flashy interactive timeline right here.

There’s a new program coming to Gran Turismo TV -- it’s the “Inside Story” of how the GTbyCitroën made the journey from polygons to production.  Check out the high-definition preview above, then fire up your copy of GT5 Prologue to download the full program.  Here’s the description from Polyphony Digital:

The process from its design sketch to scale model, and to the creation of the actual car, is introduced personally by the Japanese designer of this vehicle, Takumi Yamamoto. The creation of the car within the game, and the “C42W, the information base of Citroen, are also introduced here.  In the finale, Kazunori Yamauchi drives the car on a circuit!

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We reported last December that Polyphony Digital’s Citroën GT may actually be headed for production.  That’s now confirmed thanks to Citroën Product Manager Vincent Besson’s recent comments to Autocar.  Of course, no pricing or official specifications have been released, but we do know that it won’t contain the futuristic fuel-cells that we’ve played with in GT5 Prologue.  Instead, the French company will enlist V8 power from a GM or Ford motor, much like the one found in the concept that the car magazines have been playing with.  As was originally speculated, production will be limited to no more than 20 units, so you’d better get those orders in right away…  Thanks to Alex P. for the tip!