So here's a short update on how things went for the first three days of GT Academy (North America):
Day ONE: Jump off the plane in England and one of the judges, Rob Barff, picks me up. Apparently the whole crew was hungover from the party from the night before lol. I hopped around to a few different terminals and met up with a couple of the other guys. Then jumped in a van with my man Gonçalo Gomes who dropped us off at another terminal. Once again switching cars and hitching a ride with "The Transporter" Louise Osborne. She took a group of us to Silverstone (Don't forget your seatbelt for that one hahaha). Oh, and if you have to pee like Edgar Lau, forget about it, she's not stopping...it's only 5 more minutes hahaha.
Louise dumped us off at the Snooze Box which is where we would crash for the night. A few of us went out for a walk and checked out all the racing that was going on around us. We ate a nice dinner then called it an early night...(i couldn't sleep, too excited!)
Day TWO: Grabbed a quick breakfast at the snooze box then went for a run. We met with the production crew and did some TV related stuff with the Nismo Jukes. We were then broken up into three groups of four and went through medical checks, did some fitness tests and ran about 3.5 miles around the perimeter of the Silverstone Circuit. Ran timed hill sprints and did pushups. This day was just a baseline test for the judges to see out fitness level. It was one hell of a workout.
Day THREE: AND IT BEGINS!!
We ran the 370z around the Stowe circuit for the benchmark challenge, then we analyzed the data and took our second runs. We drove the Open wheel cars for 12 laps around Stowe and discussed the details of the Quadrathalon Challenge. Then we drove Nissan GT-R's around the Silverstone International Circuit for 3 laps. HOLY *bleep* THAT CAR IS AWESOME!!!!
Then it was time to run the Quadrathalon! I pulled the open wheel car as hard as I could. Thanks to my trainer Philippe DeRosier I was able to get a great start pulling that car and came out of the harness first. We had to run for about a mile and Nic Hammann flew by me like I was standing still...(check that boy for performance enhancers lol kidding). He was quickly out of sight and soon enough I was passed by another rival, Mark Pinnell. I was third to the Open wheelers and was able to hold that spot for the 3 laps around the wet and slippery course. I was hoping I could gain some ground once I got on the bike but Mark was pacing me pretty well, looking back and picking it up any time I gained on him. Nic was long gone! I was right on Mark's tail getting into the GT-R's but couldn't make up any ground on the wet track and I might have said a few *bleeps* in the car. It was so much fan taking part in that challenge and I'm really happy with where I finished that day.
Next week is a whole new story. Please feel free to ask any questions about what happened so far! Thanks everyone for reading!
