My Austrian SLS Adventure

My journey towards the Austrian Finals started off last December when details of the Gran Turismo 5 Signature Edition Competition were announced. The idea was that you were a race manager in the game and you guided your driver from the back of a 16-car grid over five tracks by issuing different commands. The lowest combined times in each region made it through to the finals. It sounds easy but involved a lot of work and a bit of luck. You had to pick a virtual driver and develop him to the peak of his career and even then he might not have been competitive just like in real life. I got lucky with my first driver and stuck with him but the German finalist for instance had four Playstation 3s running 24/7 for two months churning out drivers which eventually led to having a fleet of drivers individually suited to each track! The qualifiers for the competition ran from Dec 27th until Jan 31st. At the end I was at the top of my region, which was UK and Ireland, by over 6 seconds and finished up 5th fastest worldwide to take my place against 14 other finalists from around the globe. More details concerning the finals emerged later including the venue: The newly opened Red Bull Ring in Austria and the judges: 5 time DTM Champion and endurance racer Bernd Schneider and 13 time f1 race winner David Coulthard

The trip was basically all expenses paid. I had my flights paid for and was ferried to a 4-star hotel in a new Mercedes E Class, where the room and all of the food was free. The hotel was the base for the first challenge on Monday night. After being introduced to the car and the rules of the competition we were off. The first challenge was races in the game itself. We were brought into the simulators, five people at a time where we had three laps to post a quick qualifying time and the grids for the three five-car heats were decided based on this time. We each had a judge beside us to determine if we left the track or cheated which would result in a five-second penalty. I had the sixth fastest time, meaning I started second in the third heat with the winners and two fastest second place times going through to the final. My heat was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. I sat down into my simulator and was completely fixated on the screen. The winner ran away with the race but I was pushed the whole way to the line for second after losing time by evading a crazy lunge from the inside which resulted in the other car ending in the gravel. After I finished I was so relieved to have made it to the final and looked to my right to see who my judge was, and it was none other than 5 time DTM champion Bernd Schneider who was watching and judging me playing a Playstation game! There were some major upsets during the heats. Two of the favourites put their cars off and failed to qualify for the final, one of them being a double simulator racing world champion! So we then had a qualifier for the final and I ended up on the back of the grid. During the race I peaked at third but eventually finished fourth. I was ecstatic as I maintain that it was my weakest part of the competition.

After finishing fourth in the GT5 time-trial on Monday night, I was feeling really confident for the rest of the competition. On Tuesday we headed off to the track at 7.15 for a long days competition. We had a practice in the morning in the SLS's and in the afternoon we had the second challenge: Autocross, the first of the real driving challenges. I didn't cope too well with the traction control as we had to leave it fully on and I couldn't get the car to behave in my style. However, I still managed to salvage fifth in the challenge, which I thought was great.

Next up was a test of driving agility in which we had to drive the cars between pylons, which were only a few inches wider than the cars themselves. This was not the easiest when all the cars were left hand drive and I had never driven one before! I took 1 minute 51 seconds off my time in practice to take the fastest time in the challenge by seven seconds, however I had 20 seconds of penalties for hitting pylons compared to only 10 from the second placed time that put me back into second.

The last of the challenges was consistent lap times on the GP track and I cleaned up. Over 3 laps my total difference was 0.2 of a second compared to 1.3 seconds for 2nd. So after the 4 challenges I qualified first for the semi-finals with a substantial lead over the second qualifier.

In the semi-finals we started with a clean slate and it was a knockout drag race competition. We raced for 200m then stopped in a box at the end. The person who came to a standstill inside the box first won. I won my semi-final and made it to the final. David Coulthard was a great help to me all day and advised me on tactics for the final, a luxury that my rival didn't have. Some the other finalists seemed to be nearly scared to have a conversation with him but I walked up and introduced myself straight away and being Irish immediately started slagging him. He seemed to take a shine to me as he advised me all day and even sat down at my table and had dinner with me, my dad and 2 others.

In the final my nerves eventually got the better of me and I was too hesitant on the brakes, meaning I overshot the box by half a foot. Marco Calvo from Spain took the win and the car. But I was very happy with my performance as I was realistically aiming for the top four, and to drive that beast of a car for the day was amazing. The day was topped off by a barbeque and free bar for the evening and into the night, which oddly neither Marco nor the other French finalists bothered to turn up to. Needless to say I don't remember much after the half a bottle of champagne that wasn't wasted on trying to soak David Coulthard was downed just before the bottom of the stairs to the podium! It was a fantastic once in a lifetime experience in which lots of new friends were made and I can easily say that it was worth the extra €130 for the game and the month of my life I spent inside on the PS3!

Id like to say a big thanks to all the TDC members who wished me luck and helped me out. Much appreciated!

Last edited by guyfo on Sun Jul 17, 2011 6:56 pm; edited 1 time in total

We'll done Guy.. I've been following this.. That must have been a really great experience... Smile

Yea it was really brilliant! The one thing that i was really surprised about is that the sls isnt as quick as my black mini! From maybe 0-40 the mini would absolutely eat it. After that umm not so much. The sls doesn't ever seem to loose the battle against the air!

Not that surprising really.. From 0-30 or so it would be hard to beat a proper autotest car.. It's from 30-100 where the SLS would excel...

Brilliant write up Guy and Congratulations. Fantastic Result.

Well done Guy, what a great experience!! Very Happy

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Well done Guy, great result. You're right though, not many people get to sit in an SLS let alone drive it around all day in anger. Great experience and its nice to see an Irish flag on the podium. Congrats

Well done Guy, what a great experience. Did they not give a lesser (if there is such a thing) AMG as a consolation prize?