Fans of rarely used circuits will have light-up eyes in this week’s new Gran Turismo 7 Online Time Trial, as we’re taking a visit to a course that’s never been used in an official scheduled event for a hot lap competition.
Until the end of September, Blue Moon Bay Infield B had been entirely absent from any curated event — even in single-player — in GT7. That streak was broken with a Daily Race at the forward track, and now the reverse variant is here for a Time Trial less than a month later on.
As for the car, it’s another outing for BMW’s boulevard-cruising — and one-time Bond car, until it was sliced in half — Z8 convertible. The Z8, designed as a concept homage to the classic 507 and originally designated Z07 before being developed for production, puts the E39-generation M5’s V8 to good use in a two-seat soft-top.
You’ll be driving the car in standard form on Sports Hard tires around the five-corner circuit, and fortunately only three of the five require any braking at all. Take it flat out from the exit of turn two until you reach the final corner, and watch out for the compression there in the relatively soft Z8.
It’s a very quick lap as a result, with the fastest times now in the region of 55.6 seconds. The gold marker is currently 57.337s, and there’s really only small margins to gain here due to the short lap-time. We reckon a 57.1 is already good enough, and if you’re into the 56-second area you can probably take the next two weeks off.
The Gr.2 event that began last Thursday remains in place, and while there’s been a little movement on the leaderboard it’s pretty much in line with what we expected from the initial attempt.
Although the original world record didn’t remain for as long as we’d anticipated, it’d still be eighth on the present leaderboard which has seen the marker lowered by an impressive quarter-second. Right now it’s a 1:30.527 — one of only two times in the 30.5s — and it sets the gold target at 1:33.242.
As a result, we’re going to stick with our estimate from last week that beating a 1:33.2 will probably see you safe enough but, as ever, always be wary of last-minute sniping. Also, you should definitely stick with a 2016 GT500 car for this; we only picked the (BMW) McLaren for the image because it’s rarely seen thanks to Gr.2 BOP.
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 30.
Gran Turismo 7 Lap Time Challenge October 23 – Blue Moon Bay
- Track: Blue Moon Bay Infield B Reverse
- Car: BMW Z8 ’01 – Garage/Rental Car
- Power/Weight/PP Limit: BOP (H)
- Tires: Sports Hard
- Settings: Fixed
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
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