Did your parents ever tell you to stop playing video games? To go study instead? For most of us, it was probably the right advice. For some… well… it wasn’t.

The GT Academy 2010 is a virtual racing competition started by the Sony racing simulation game, Gran Turismo, and Nissan available to 15 European countries, as well as Australia and New Zealand. How does it work? Each user downloads a “time trial demo” onto their Playstation 3 and tries to post his/her best lap times. The fastest 20 virtual drivers will then go to a “boot camp” racing school at Silverstone. The top driver who comes out on top will be awarded with a full season race drive in a Nissan 370Z race car in the European GT4 Cup!

How successful has it been so far? 3 weeks after the demo was made available on the 17th of December in 2009, over 1 million users have downloaded it. The competition ends at midnight, GMT, on the 24th of January.

Stay tuned! Pun intended.

elwehbi@brakebanzeen

This post was written by guest blogger El Wehbi, from the automotive blog Brake Banzeen! To read more of his work, visit brakebanzeen.com.