Polyphony Digital has announced the next “Exhibition Series” in the Gran Turismo World Series online championship, with six races across the two championships over the next four weeks.
It’s another short teaser event which invites players to race with some of the new content added in today’s 1.31 update. Once again, both championships — the Nations Cup and Manufacturers Cup — are represented, although there’s some notable calendar changes of which players should be aware.
Oddly, the events run consecutively rather than concurrently this season, with the three Nations Cup rounds all taking place before the three Manufacturers Cup rounds. They’re also alternating days, for the most part, with two Saturdays and a Wednesday in Nations and two Wednesdays and a Saturday in Manufacturers.
The full calendar is as follows:
2022/23 Exhibition Series Season 4 – Nations Cup
- Round 1 – April 1 – Brands Hatch GP/Audi RS5 DTM – 23 laps
- Round 2 – April 8 – Red Bull Ring/Gr.4 – 12 laps
- Round 3 – April 12 – Grand Valley Highway-1/Gr.3 – 17 laps
2022/23 Exhibition Series Season 3 – Manufacturers Cup
- Round 1 – April 15 – Interlagos/Gr.3 – 28 laps
- Round 2 – April 19 – Daytona Road Course/Gr.3 – 21 laps
- Round 3 – April 22 – Nurburgring Endurance/Gr.3 – 5 laps
In each case, your score will be your best single round’s score, and only your last race entry in each round will count towards your score — whether you enter all available slots, just one, or anything in-between.
It’s notable that the Manufacturers Cup, for the first time, is a single-category event. The Gr.4 cars don’t form a part of this season at all, even after a recent change in that class’s Balance of Performance which finally addressed the issue of overpowered AWD cars.
All six rounds have a five-minute qualifying session, with the exception of the Nurburgring Endurance event which allows 13 minutes. Partial settings are also allowed in every event, by way of the brake balance controller — and its adjustment — being a permitted component.
For the first time in the series’ history there’s going to be a two-tier setup that’s reflected in some of the race regulations and available entry slots.
GT World Series operates on a bracket system. Players with a Driver Rating of A or better will be in the “GT1 League”, those with a DR of B in the “GT2 League”, and those of DR C or lower in the “GT3 League”.
Only the players in GT1 League will be eligible for the finals events, along with the coveted “S” Driver Rating rank, but you’ll score points and be ranked in every league. You will be locked into the League appropriate to your Driver Rating when you enter your first race in each championship, whether your rating changes or not.
This season, GT1 players will have a different experience to those in the other leagues. The actual racing won’t be markedly different, but there’s two factors to consider — the minor of which is that tire wear is turned off in qualifying for GT2/GT3.
More importantly is the reduced number of entry slots for GT1, with only three per round for each region while GT2/GT3 get the same ten slots we’ve seen in recent seasons. The timings for GT1 League are as follows:
GT1 Entry Slot Timings (UTC) Nations Cup
- Oceania: 0600, 0800, 1000
- Asia: 1000, 1200, 1400
- Europe/Middle East/Africa (Saturday): 1400, 1600, 1800
- Europe/Middle East/Africa (Wednesday): 1700, 1900, 2100
- Central/South America (Saturday): 2100, 2300, 0100 (+1)
- Central/South America (Wednesday): 2200, 0000 (+1), 0200 (+1)
- North America: 2300, 0100 (+1), 0300 (+1)
GT1 Entry Slot Timings (UTC) Manufacturers Cup
- Asia-Oceania: 1000, 1200, 1400
- Europe/Middle East/Africa (Saturday): 1400, 1600, 1800
- Europe/Middle East/Africa (Wednesday): 1700, 1900, 2100
- Americas (Wednesday): 2100, 2300, 0100 (+1)
- Americas (Saturday): 2200, 0000 (+1), 0200 (+1)
GT2 and GT3 League have hourly slots running across the bulk of each day — starting 6-7 hours earlier than the GT1 League races, with the final slots up to two hours later. You’ll need to check your local GT site for both Manufacturers and Nations for the precise timings.
As yet, the official 2023 season hasn’t been announced, but the Season 4 annoucement notes that “the start date of the official GTWS 2023 Series will be announced at a later date” — suggesting it will be as soon as early May.
We have in previous years seen invitations to live events based on results from an Exhibition or Pre-Season series, so although there’s nothing officially at stake right now it may be worth treating the event as though there is…
See more articles on Gran Turismo World Series.
