2014 United Kingdom General Discussion

  • Thread starter numbnuts70
  • 420 comments
  • 28,102 views
Yeah it doesn't seem to be on the nismo Channel (some very good stuff on there though)

Shame as I'd like to watch it
 
I haven't seen it posted anywhere here yet, but there's a series looking at the GT Academy on Eurosport at the moment called GT Academy Masterclass. Each episode is only 10 minutes or so in length. I think there's a repeat of the second episode on tonight at 11pm (UK), but the previous episodes can be viewed on the Eurosport website: https://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/video/nissan-gt-academy-masterclass-154937485.html

edit: the page for all videos is here https://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/l/gt-academy-masterclass-channel/ , and it appears to be on almost nightly on eurosport (although I got a recording of some snooker on ES2 on Tuesday night on my planner).
 
Last edited:
Hi guys, I found something very interesting online yesterday on www.mylaps.com ....It was the laptimes from the stockCar race at GT Academy.

I was surprised to see that Rob Barff decided to give myself (Stuart Millar) only a 9 lap stint, whereas some of the other guys from our team got over 20 laps in the car. I don't believe that this was a fair assessment of performance as obviously lap-times will improve with the more laps you do.

I suppose there's nothing that can be done now. But I looked at everyone else's first 9 laps. And if everyone from the team had only had 9 laps like myself I would have been 2nd fastest overall :(

Its a shame but there's nothing that can be done now. Still, its good to find out that information. And it brings in the question of the fairness of the competition.
 
The Watcher
Hi guys, I found something very interesting online yesterday on www.mylaps.com ....It was the laptimes from the stockCar race at GT Academy.

I was surprised to see that Rob Barff decided to give myself (Stuart Millar) only a 9 lap stint, whereas some of the other guys from our team got over 20 laps in the car. I don't believe that this was a fair assessment of performance as obviously lap-times will improve with the more laps you do.

I suppose there's nothing that can be done now. But I looked at everyone else's first 9 laps. And if everyone from the team had only had 9 laps like myself I would have been 2nd fastest overall :(

Its a shame but there's nothing that can be done now. Still, its good to find out that information. And it brings in the question of the fairness of the competition.
Click to expand...

Looking at the lap times, I'm guessing you were second to drive the car in the race? In any event, all six of you had your fastest laps within a tenth of a second, and none of you crashed, so it would hardly be practical to decide who's quick and who isn't from the stock car race alone.

According to the Day 1 roundup post, you did a benchmark challenge around the Stowe circuit earlier that day; I wouldn't be surprised if it had a significant effect on eliminations (it usually did in previous years).

I guess I'm just trying to give the competition the benefit of the doubt :)
 
Not directed at anyone in particular, when it comes to judges choosing who stays and who goes you can have all the talent in the world, be super fit and an awesome driver but if the judges don't warm to you, you're gone, you need to sell yourself as best you can without coming across as arrogant,You can see it in some of the past GT Academys where fit guys that are awesome behind the wheel get booted because they're ass's.

On top of having the talent you need to be likable, talent alone isn't enough.

And Stuart, I agree you shouldn't have been put out at that point.
 
The Watcher
Hi guys, I found something very interesting online yesterday on www.mylaps.com ....It was the laptimes from the stockCar race at GT Academy.

I was surprised to see that Rob Barff decided to give myself (Stuart Millar) only a 9 lap stint, whereas some of the other guys from our team got over 20 laps in the car. I don't believe that this was a fair assessment of performance as obviously lap-times will improve with the more laps you do.

I suppose there's nothing that can be done now. But I looked at everyone else's first 9 laps. And if everyone from the team had only had 9 laps like myself I would have been 2nd fastest overall :(

Its a shame but there's nothing that can be done now. Still, its good to find out that information. And it brings in the question of the fairness of the competition.
Click to expand...

I only got 5 laps in my stint, I started the race in 4th, got us up to 1st and then the safety car came out so we pitted. I did my job, and it was best for the team that we pitted then.

This was a team event, yes they would have taken something from it, but it is not weighed very heavily compared to the individual driving activities.

Can someone record the UK episodes and upload them somewhere, would love to watch your series.
 
@gm matthew

Yeah I went second in the StockCars. And the lap-times were extremely close.

The benchmark test at Stowe was a weird one...they never released any lap-times from it although I'm 100% sure I wasn't slowest as afew from the UK made some mistakes.

As for the day at Bedford Autodrome I was P2 in the LMP. P3 in the Single Seater and P5 in the Caterhams out of the 6 UK guys.

I'm not complaining whatsoever. I really enjoyed my time at Silverstone. I'm just letting anyone on GTPlanet that plans of entering next year know that there are some strange decisions made regarding eliminations. That goes for the Italian guys and Polish guy I spoke to aswell when I was there.
 
Having seen the first two episodes, I don't think this series is anywhere near as good as last year's. It practically feels as though there's an elimination after each challenge, which isn't much of a stretch as we've seen only four challenges and three eliminations already. Given that they rushed through the first four days for episodes one and two, how are they planning to fill up the remaining three episodes?

Also, in the 2013 series we actually got an idea of how well each gamer is doing, whereas in this series I have absolutely no idea how Luke, Karl and Alex were stacking up against each other (other than who gets eliminated when, which we all already know).

The North American series is currently proving much more entertaining.

@The Watcher Glad to hear you had a good time at Silverstone regardless of the result 👍
 
gm matthew
Having seen the first two episodes, I don't think this series is anywhere near as good as last year's. It practically feels as though there's an elimination after each challenge, which isn't much of a stretch as we've seen only four challenges and three eliminations already. Given that they rushed through the first four days for episodes one and two, how are they planning to fill up the remaining three episodes?

Also, in the 2013 series we actually got an idea of how well each gamer is doing, whereas in this series I have absolutely no idea how Luke, Karl and Alex were stacking up against each other (other than who gets eliminated when, which we all already know).

The North American series is currently proving much more entertaining.

@The Watcher Glad to hear you had a good time at Silverstone regardless of the result 👍
Click to expand...

Totally agree. In my opinion the program/race camp has got worse over the last few years, it plays up far too much for the cameras. I mean do we really need flames and flashing lights everywhere? And what happened to the track based challenges of the first few years'? I want to see how the competitors cope on the track, not how quickly they can go through a stunt routine.
 
Yeah I've watched the furst two 2014 episodes and my thoughts were, needs more timed driving challenges. Have a stint, show everyone and the viewers the times and then do a second stint . Slowest driver gets kicked.
 
nickg07
Yeah I've watched the furst two 2014 episodes and my thoughts were, needs more timed driving challenges. Have a stint, show everyone and the viewers the times and then do a second stint . Slowest driver gets kicked.
Click to expand...

How about not to the last part :lol: Kicking people out based on their performance in one situation isn't the way to go. Although I agree they should have shown more driving, surely the viewers would be more interested in seeing us do 140mph in GTRs around Silverstone than changing tyres.
 
Spurgy 777
Although I agree they should have shown more driving, surely the viewers would be more interested in seeing us do 140mph in GTRs around Silverstone than changing tyres.
Click to expand...
It's television. Of course they're gonna want to show the stupid parts. :lol:
 
Spurgy 777
How about not to the last part :lol: Kicking people out based on their performance in one situation isn't the way to go. Although I agree they should have shown more driving, surely the viewers would be more interested in seeing us do 140mph in GTRs around Silverstone than changing tyres.
Click to expand...

But how else can they decide who to kick. It is an elimination show afterall.

but more transparency proper timed sessions in varieties of cars/tracks hot lapping. What's changing a tyre or running an assault course got to do with anything. You can practice that but you can't replace driving talent. ..
 
nickg07
. What's changing a tyre or running an assault course got to do with anything. You can practice that but you can't replace driving talent. ..
Click to expand...
I can kind of see would do that. They want to see how calm you are under pressure(tire change), and what your fitness is/how much you'll push yourself. But I do think there should by more driving(from what I can tell be watching the shows).
 
If you're on TV in an elimination game show having qualified to be there, driving cars you've never driven before on tracks you might never have druven in real life then I'm sure that's plenty of pressure to be getting on with? The events may as well be fair or as fair as possible.
 
nickg07
But how else can they decide who to kick. It is an elimination show afterall.

but more transparency proper timed sessions in varieties of cars/tracks hot lapping. What's changing a tyre or running an assault course got to do with anything. You can practice that but you can't replace driving talent. ..
Click to expand...

They decide it based on all challenges we'd done so far, on and off camera (for most of the eliminations), the judges really don't care how fast we change a tyre, but that's all you really get to see. Most of what they judge it on, driving GTRs, 370zs and the cars at Bedford, you don't see or even hear about on TV. I actually feel sorry for anyone trying to work out why I was there as long as I was because I did badly in 3 out of the 4 TV challenges I did, but was doing well off camera in the actual driving :lol:
 
Looks like they're going to show the final race in the fourth episode; so much for five episodes. :indiff:

I'm still staggered that they chose not to show the benchmark at all, even though it's been one of the key challenges each year. It would have at least given us a vague idea of who was quick in a car right off the bat.

I'm also not a big fan of how challenges decided a bunch of the eliminations, particularly the Gymkhana challenge where Ben was struggling with a single obstacle in a left-hand-drive car. For what it's worth, I think Ben could have been a good choice for the buggy race ;)
 

Latest Posts

Back