There’s a bit of a surprise in store in the latest Gran Turismo 7 Online Time Trial starting today, running over the next two weeks and offering up to 2m credits depending on how close you are to the world’s best.
We’ve seen three of the five cars from September’s 1.63 update getting time trial events so far, and while you might be expecting another — for one of the two Toyotas yet to see use in a lap time challenge — it’s actually a category-limited event for the Gr.2 cars this week.
What this means is that you can use any of the ten Gr.2 category cars to compete in the event, which requires you to go as quickly as you can around the full Autopolis International course on Racing Soft tires.
However, the class is a bit of a mismatch. It features three 2016-season, GT500 class, Super GT cars from Honda, Lexus, and Nissan, three equivalent cars from the same brands for the 2008 season, a single 2019 DTM Class 1 Audi, and a trio of classic Le Mans cars from entirely different rule sets across three successive seasons.
The class balancing means that only the 2016 GT500s are truly competitive, and it should be noted that all three do appear in the top 100 leaderboard at preset — but the NSX is the one the most are picking. We only used the BMW McLaren for the screenshot because we don’t often get to see it…
Currently the world record for the event is a 1:30.789 (and set in the GT-R) and it’s so far ahead of the rest that it could be the case that it remains the world record right through the two week span of the event. That means that the gold marker at present, at 1:33.426, could well be enough but we’d suggest aiming to beat a 1:33.2 to be on the safer side.
Last week’s event featuring the new, and locked-down, Mazda Spirit Racing Roadster 12R still has seven days to run, and despite the initial clustering of times suggesting that players were already near the limit the event has seen an absolute flurry of activity.
That’s resulted in destruction of the world record, which is currently held by Igor Fraga (yes, that Igor Fraga) at a 1:46.861, or about half a second faster than the early leading times. However the good news is that he’s one of only two drivers in the 1:46s (Ryota Kokubun — and again, yes that one — being the other) so there’s probably very little time left on the table.
As a result, our estimate last week was a bit optimistic, and you already need to be close to a flat 1:50 to be in the gold bracket. It’s likely that it’ll still just be enough by the end of next week, but you’re going to want to see a 1:49 for a little security.
In order to access the Online Time Trials, you’ll need to unlock Sport Mode, by completing Menu Book 9 (“Championship: Tokyo Highway Parade”) in the GT Cafe single player hub. As it’s just you against the clock and not a direct, head-to-head multiplayer event, PlayStation Plus is not required.
You’ll usually need to be within 3% of the fastest time globally once the event finishes in order to secure “gold” status and a 2m credit bonus prize. There’s smaller prizes of one million for being within 5%, and 250,000cr for bronze at 10% off.
The events update every Thursday, with each individual challenge usually remaining available for two weeks and the oldest of the two events being replaced each week. You can look forward to the next new Time Trial arriving at 0700 UTC on Thursday October 23.
Gran Turismo 7 Lap Time Challenge October 16 – Autopolis
- Track: Autopolis International
- Car: Gr.2 – Garage/Rental Car
- Power/Weight/PP Limit: BOP (M)
- Tires: Racing Soft
- Settings: Fixed
Gran Turismo 7 Lap Time Challenge October 9 – Deep Forest
- Track: Deep Forest Raceway
- Car: Mazda Spirit Racing Roadster 12R ’23 – Garage/Rental Car
- Power/Weight/PP Limit: BOP (M)
- Tires: Sports Hard
- Settings: Fixed
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