It’s a throwback to an event that took place just over a year ago, bringing together the same track and brand — though in a different car — for one of the shortest, fastest laps you can imagine, and some pretty tight margins as a result.
Once again you’ll be visiting the Daytona Tri-Oval for a flat-out, full-throttle challenge and you’ll be driving a Chaparral to do so. It’s not the madcap, spaceship-engined 2X concept this time, rather the more conventional 2J. Not that “conventional” applies to a car from 1970 shaped like a fridge with a pair of fans and a Lexan skirt to suck it to the ground.
It’s not an event that requires much thought, as it is literally a case of mashing the pedal (or button) into its housing as the 2J hits the top of third gear at 220mph, and hugging the yellow line until the time comes up on the screen — and you’re looking for a sub-41s lap.
As with the 2X event in 2024, the boundary for gold has changed. To score the top prize you’ll need to be within 1% of the world record rather than the regular 3%. The nature of the Time Trial should mean that’s not too difficult, but the gap from the record to the bottom of gold is only just over four-tenths of a second — at 40.955 compared to a 40.550 at present.
We wouldn’t expect a huge chunk of time to come off that and, given that every player in the top 100 is comfortably within the 40.5 zone, any time that begins 40.8 should be easily enough to get gold.
The more regular affair involving the new Aston Martin Vantage remains available for another week too, and times are starting to stabilize at about the pace we were expecting.
At the moment the world record is a 1:50.866, with a few other drivers also nipping under the 1:51 mark as we predicted. That sets the current gold time at a 1:54.191, but we reckon there’s still a bit more to come so you should look at getting yourself into the 1:53s if you want that 2m reward to be safe.
In order to access the Online Time Trials, you’ll need to unlock Sport Mode, by completing Menu Book 9 (“Championship: Tokyo Highway Parade”) in the GT Cafe single player hub. As it’s just you against the clock and not a direct, head-to-head multiplayer event, PlayStation Plus is not required.
You’ll usually need to be within 3% of the fastest time globally once the event finishes in order to secure “gold” status and a 2m credit bonus prize. There’s smaller prizes of one million for being within 5%, and 250,000cr for bronze at 10% off.
The events update every Thursday, with each individual challenge usually remaining available for two weeks and the oldest of the two events being replaced each week. You can look forward to the next new Time Trial arriving at 0700 UTC on Thursday April 10.
Gran Turismo 7 Lap Time Challenge April 3 – Daytona
- Track: Daytona Tri-Oval
- Car: Chaparral 2J ’70 – Garage/Rental Car
- Power/Weight/PP Limit: BOP (H)
- Tires: Racing Hard
- Settings: Fixed
Gran Turismo 7 Lap Time Challenge March 27 – Watkins Glen
- Track: Watkins Glen Long Course
- Car: Aston Martin Vantage ’18 – Garage/Rental Car
- Power/Weight/PP Limit: BOP (M)
- Tires: Sports Soft
- Settings: Fixed
