http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVr5rQB1pRU

Since Kazunori Yamauchi announced the next Gran Turismo 5 update was being held back due to ongoing problems with the PlayStation Network, GT fans have had special reason to closely follow news about the service. Fortunately, Sony has taken yet another important step forward, bringing the PSN Store back online today in the U.S. and Europe.

The June event of GTPlanet’s Online Monthly Race Series (OMRS) is about to kick off, and the ante has been upped with not one but two downloadable copies of Gran Turismo PSP up for grabs. This month’s event will take place on Trial Mountain Reverse in the Mazda RX-7 Spirit R Type A this Saturday, June 4th. Check the official forum topic for all the details.

The 24 Hours of Le Mans is just a few weeks away now, and Lucas Ordoñez is doing what he can to get ready. Take a look at this video which shows one of the more interesting ways Lucas is being psychologically prepared for the hardships of a 24-hour race, with a simulated endurance drive around England in a Nissan GT-R.

If you competed in GT Academy USA earlier this year, you know exactly how difficult it was to make the cut during the Round 3 time trials. Those who made it to the National Finals in Orlando are obviously very talented, and the final 16 going to Silverstone next week are the best in the country. What’s it like to make it that far in the competition, and how can you do it, yourself?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_UdLgoft9w

Another new Seasonal Event has been added to Gran Turismo 5: the “Supercar Festival”. Open to all cars up to 700PP (with no tire restrictions), get ready to bring out some of your biggest guns for these five new races:

Kazunori Yamauchi is back to posting messages on Twitter Sunday afternoon, and he offered a bit of information on what’s holding up the next Gran Turismo 5 update. According to translations by our own SHIRAKAWA Akira, Polyphony Digital is waiting until the PlayStation Network finally “settles down” before publishing the next revision of the game.

In addition to the Gran Turismo series, I’ve greatly enjoyed Codemaster’s rally games over the years, and if the enthusiasm in our forums is any indication – I’m not alone! The latest game in the series, DiRT 3, will be officially released this Tuesday, May 24, and I’m happy to announce GTPlanet’s new dedicated DiRT 3 Forum is now open to everyone in our community who will be picking up the title (it will be available for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and as a download via Steam for the PC). Enjoy!

To help get you in the spirit for next month’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, Polyphony Digital has just pushed out a new Seasonal Event in Gran Turismo 5 with a focus on everything French. The championship runs across five different circuits and, of course, must be driven in a French car with 500PP or less:

While the cars are usually the stars in Gran Turismo 5 (and rightfully so), some of GTPlanet’s users have turned their cameras away from the track to get a closer look at the exquisite detail found in many of the buildings and landscapes in the game. Here’s a few of my favorite images that highlight so many little details that often go unnoticed (don’t miss Polyphony Digital’s photographers in this shot). If you get inspired, head on over to our GT5 Photomode forums and share your own!

Sony has released a batch of pictures from last week’s GT Academy 2011 Netherlands region finals, where 24-year-old Thomas Arends (Thomms) from The Hague and 20-year-old Edwin Bos (GTHQ_BosjesmanEB) from Groningen came out on top after completing a series of physical, media, and driving tests (just as finalists did in the UK & Ireland).

As PlayStation Network services are coming back online, many of you will notice that you now finally have access to the new “Muscle Car” Seasonal Event races in Gran Turismo 5. It was actually launched shortly before PSN went down last month, though few people got to see it. Here’s a look at the races, available to pre-1980 American cars with no more than 550PP and any kind of tires:

It looks like the long wait is nearly over – Sony will begin restoring PlayStation Network services around the world over the next 24 hours. A new PS3 firmware update is already available and will be required to connect to the network when it finally does come back online in your location (SCEA is maintaing a service map for U.S. users here). Everyone will, of course, be prompted to change their PSN passwords upon signing in. Watch the video above from Sony president Kazuo Hirai for more information.

After celebrating 10 years online in January, I am excited to announce that GTPlanet has already hit another milestone, with over 5 million messages having now been posted in our forums. Since the release of GT5 in November of last year, the community has grown by nearly 1.1 million posts, with an average of more than 6,300 new posts per day. 7-year member and Super Moderator, TB, takes the honor of making the 5 millionth post, with this very appropriate celebratory message.

Regional finals for GT Academy 2011 are taking place around Europe, and the official results from the UK & Ireland event are in with two GTPlanet members earning tickets to Silverstone! 19-year-old Jann Mardenborough (TECHNIKRS4) from Cardiff and 29-year-old wild-card winner James Hudson (TwinturboCH) from Bromley came out on top after a challenging event. Not only did the finalists have to compete against each other, they also had to prove themselves in a series of media, driving, and physical fitness tests at Brands Hatch.

GT Academy winner Lucas Ordoñez and his Signatech Nissan team competed in the Spa Francorchamps 1000km on Saturday, in front of a massive crowd of over 35,000 people. Starting from third-place qualifying position in the LMP2 class, Signatech took the class lead in the first corner of the race. All went well until contact with a GT car required work in the pits that put them 4 laps down, then a steering problem later in the race required even more unexpected repairs.

As you’ve probably noticed, it’s been nearly seven days now since Sony last offered up a “this week” time frame for the restoration of PlayStation Network services. While there’s still no real end to the downtime in sight, Sony has at least acknowledged they’re probably going to miss that soft deadline with their latest blog post:

Winner of the first GT Academy and ILMC 2011 driver Lucas Ordonez has teamed up with other drivers on the grid at this weekend’s Spa Francorchamps 1000km to host a track-side Gran Turismo 5 challenge, benefiting victims of the devastating tsunamis in Japan.

Sony held a press conference in Tokyo today to provide more details about the PlayStation Network outage and their plans moving forward. There’s a lot of information of in the press release below, but the best news – for those of you eager to back online with GT5, at least – is they expect online gaming services to return “this week”.