At an event held in New Delhi today, Nissan India Motors kickstarted the second season of GT Academy in India in partnership with PlayStation. GT Academy is a collaboration between PlayStation and Nissan that uses the virtual world of the Gran Turismo 6 game to unearth real-world racing talent. Now in its seventh year, GT Academy includes separate competitions for Europe (France, Italy, UK, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Hungary, Poland and Czech Republic), International group (Australia, Mexico, North Africa, Turkey and United States) and Asia (India, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia and Japan).
Nissan India has announced the schedule for GT Academy India Live Qualifying, which will begin on June 5th 2015 in Delhi and then will go to Mumbai, Bangalore and Chennai. The details of the schedule are as under :
| City | Dates | Venue |
| Delhi | 5th – 7th June | DLF Place, Saket |
| Mumbai | 12th– 14th June | Infinity 2, Malad (West) |
| Bangalore | 19th – 21st June | Phoenix Market City, Whitefield |
| Chennai | 26th – 28th June | Express Avenue, Royapettah |
According to Nissan India, online gamers will have an opportunity to drive the Nissan GT-R LM Nismo as a part of qualifying. Ten winners from the Live Events will then join ten winners from the online game at the Indian National Final to be held in July 2015 in Chennai with the chance to grab one of six places at the famous Silverstone Race Camp.
Last year over 5000 gamers from all over India competed against each other in the race to the GT Academy final race camp. Six fastest contestants from the National Final in India then made it to Silverstone to compete with the winners from other regions. Abhinay Bikkani, one of the finalists from India last year, is currently racing in the Nissan Micra Cup in Canada, as informed by the company during the launch event.
Announcing the second season of GT Academy in India, Guillaume Sicard, President – Nissan India Operations said, “ When we speak about innovation and excitement at Nissan, we not only mean our cars but go beyond that with initiatives like GT Academy. Over the years, the competition has given aspirants and dreamers an opportunity to race real racing cars on tracks all over the world. We are glad that we were able to fulfil one Indian’s dream last year and proudly launch the GT Academy 2015 today in India.”
The 2015 GT Academy competition will be the biggest year yet for the virtual to reality competition. Gamers from up to 24 countries around the world will be able to enter, with GT Academy International and Asia reaching a staggering 2.2 billion potential entrants. Nissan and PlayStation are looking for the very best to progress from virtual racing to the real world of racing for Nissan. This is an ideal opportunity for the passionate individuals to show their talent in gaming and achieve their dream of earning name and fame. Since the first GT Academy competition in 2008, millions of gamers have competed for the life-changing prize of becoming a professional racing driver.
On this occasion, Nissan India also announced a new competition, ‘GT Academy Asia.’ This competition will be restricted to Asian region comprising of Thailand and India, both of which were introduced to GT Academy in 2014 as part of the International competition. This competition will also be open to gamers from Indonesia, the Philippines and Nissan and PlayStation’s homeland, Japan. The winner of the GT Academy in Asia will bag an opportunity to race at the Dubai 24hrs in January 2016.
For more information about GT Academy India including how to enter and the location of Live Events please visit: www.nissan.in/innovation/gt-
