GT: The Automotive Magazine

GT: The Auto Magazine

Featuring:GTR VS. NSX- Which Power-house Is Better?iRacing- What Is It And How Does It WorkCustom 86 GT Review- One of Japan’s Best Marvels

2013 NASCAR Improve-ments- Which Manufacturer looks better?And Much More

Untitled-1.indd 1 1/7/13 9:16 PM

Letter From the Editor:This Project has been a blast. To think that this started out as an assignment for a high school class, and then it became something else. I hope you like it. Sincerely, Nick Bernow

Table Of Contents

General Racing News

The Writers’ Rides

My Toyota 86 GT ‘12 Words & Photos- Nick Bernow

SLR: Supercar Of Its TimeWords: Nick Bernow Photos- Nick Bernow & Ian Adams

The 2013 NASCARs, Which One Looks the Best Astetically and Why?Words: Nick Bernow & Ian Adams Photos- Various

Honda NSX Vs Nissan Skyline GTRWords & Photos- Nick Bernow

iRacing- What is it and How Does it WorkWords- Nick Bernow Photos- Ian Adams

Last Page!- Our Photos and How We Took ThemWords- Nick Bernow Photos- Nick Bernow & Ian Adams

GT: The Auto Magazine


General RACING News

Gordon Wins at HomesteadJeff Gordon got his latest win at Homestead-Miami Speedway.Brad Keseloski won his first NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship.This is the last championship to be earned by Dodge in NASCAR,as the manufacturer pulled out if the sport. Courtesy of the NASCAR Wire servicePhoto: Getty Images

Formula One: Point StandingsPs Driver Pts1 Sebastien Vettel 2552 Fernando Alonso 2453 Kimi Raikkonen 1984 Mark Webber 1675 Lewis Hamilton 1656 Jenson Button 1537 Felipe Massa 958 Nico Rosberg 939 Romain Grosjean 9010 Sergio Perez 6011 Kamui Kobayashi 5812 Nico Hulkenberg 4913 Paul Di Resta 4614 Pastor Maldonado 4315 Michael Schumacher 4316 Bruno Senna 3017 Jean-Eric Vergne 1218 Daniel Ricciardo 1019 Timo Glock 020 Heikki Kovalainen 021 Vitaly Petrov 022 JÃorÃ´me D’Ambrosio 023 Charles Pic 024 Narain Karthikeyan 025 Pedro De la Rosa 0


Colin McRae: By Ian Adams

Three drivers come to mind when I think about excellence ended far too early, Dale Earnhardt Sr., Dan Wheldon, and Colin McRae. The difference being the first two was taken on the track. Colin on the other hand was killed in a helicopter crash not far from his home in Scotland. This is where we start for Colin.

Born August 5, 1968, Colin McRae began his motorsports career on Trials bikes. He soon advanced to rally and entered the Scottish Rally Championship. In 1988 he performed a giant killing act by snatch-ing the title away in a humble Vauxhall Nova. Colin’s first World Rally Championship (WRC) win came in 1993 with the factory Subaru team. He won the Rally New Zealand, claiming the first win for the Subaru WRT as well.

Colin would go on for five more seasons with Subaru winning the WRC Drivers Championship in 1995 his only Championship. In 1998 he left Subaru to more to the Ford WRT winning few rallies over his three year stint due to reliability issues with the new Ford Focus rally car. After his contract was up in 2002 he left Ford and signed with Citroen. 2003 was Colin’s last season in WRC.

In his later career Colin raced in everything he could. He ran Rally events, raced in the 24 hours du mans, and competed in two X-Games rally events finishing second to Travis Pastrana once after rolling his car on the final jump. Colin also wrecked against Ken Block in the same event the next year. Colin was killed, along with his son, and two family friends, in a helicopter crash in 2007. His family set up the Colin McRae Vision, which donates funds raised to different charities worldwide.


Ayrton Senna: By Nick Bernow

Some peoiple wonder who Ayrton Senna was. In my opinion, he was te greatest Formula 1 racer to live. However, his life was cut short at Imola in 1994. Ayrton was a humble man, he gave millions to charities in Brazil for displaced and hungry children.

He was also known as one of the fastest Formula 1 drivers that ever lived. He also had a major rivalry with Alain Prost that involved them crashing each other on two occasions at the Japanese Grand Prix. On both occasions, Senna ended up winning the championship. He was also known for mastering the street course at Monaco. When Top Gear UK did a segment on what would have been Senna’s 50th birthday, one of the people interviewed said that nobody would want to get blamed for ruining Senna’s lap time. According to the interview, most drivers could find a couple more thenths of a second, Senna on the other hand found a second and a half. This is a major improvement that almost no driver could find. He was also the most cou-rageous driver of the time. For example, one race at Spa, a driver crashed. Senna got out of his car and ran to help get the fellow driver out before the car exploded. In short he left a great legacy in the sport.


My Toyota 86 GT ‘12


Words: Nick BernowPhotos: Nick Bernow So you may be wondering, BR-Z, or 86 GT. The BR-Z/86 GT is the new cooperative design from Subaru and Toyota. It is also worth mentioning that Toyota owns a part of Subaru. Stock, they put out about the same power, use almost the same engine and they also use almost the same body. With that boringness out of the way on to my car. My 86 GT is a fully tuned, 377 BHP car. It has all the tuning upgrades available for the car installed and it also has a GT wing from GT Auto installed as well as Racing Soft tires to provide extra grip. This car is well balanced and has very good handling characteristics. At The Top Gear Test Track for example, it carried itself with ease and had very little understeer through the corners and provided for an excellent drive. The accel-eration is quick and responsive and the turning force is good for this rear wheel drive car. You would think it would oversteer immensely, espically in the Hammerhead corner, but because of the wing and front bodykit I installed from GT Auto it is quite nice to see the car perform. We then left the iconic airfield in Surrey and dropped in on Cote’d Azur(Monaco). This course is known for its hills, tight chicanes, and long straights. Surprisingly, as this car pounded around, its little turbocharged 4 cylinder boxer. It was putting out some nice lap times, and it was very consistent in cornering quality. After this quick trip to Monaco, we went to Germany to probably the most famous road course, the Nurbur-gring. Called the “Green Hell” its many twists and corners have claimed lives and it now serves as the pin-nacle of automotive testing. We took the 86 GT to the 24hr layout with no time or weather change. It is worth noting that none of the gearing was changed, just a 6-speed manual installed on this car. With that said, with the transmission fully customizable, meaning that I can change the ratios, I did not extend the gearing ratios on the transmission. This being the case, the car easily reached the top speed of 140 and hit the rev limiter in the top of sixth gear. This resulted in a long lap time of about 9 minutes 30 seconds. This car had to deal with all of the bumps of the ‘Ring and it dealt with them quite well. This track wasn’t as smooth as Monaco and The Top Gear Test Track. This is because the track has been around almost 100 years. This car has a finely tuned sport suspension to compliment its excellent styling. The styling of this car is very cool in my opinion. The standard car looked kind of bare with nothing on the back, like it was made for the wing that I had installed. It also reminds me of when the old Supra roamed the streets, it has many of the same lines and curves. It also looks like it could just get up and go without any hesitation. Final thoughts, I think I did pretty good in choosing the right car. This car is an all around good car, it could just use a little taller gearing, and a little more power. I say this because it drives through the low end of the RPM range too quickly, it feels that the car wants to go, but has too much power and too little gearing. Yes, this can be remedied, but it comes at a price to the acceleration.


Technical DataBHP 377/7900 RPMTorque 254 ft-lb/7400RPM0-60 6.891 Seconds0-100 11.608 Seconds


SLR: Supercar of Our Time


Words: Nick Bernow

Photos: Nick Bernow, Ian Adams

Some think the McLaren SLR is a grand touring car. The other side of the spectrum is that the SLR is the latest supercar to come out of the small, very English facility. We will attempt to figure out if it’s the best of both worlds or if it’s one or the other. With that in mind, lets get to it.

Let’s start off by just taking a look at the car. Yes, I know it has Mercedes badges on it, but if you look just foreword of the doors and on the deck lid, it does in fact say McLaren. Merc does provide the body, and of course, the badge. Ignoring all of that garnish is easy though. This car is striking to just gaze at. The lines of this car are spectacular to just look at in a standstill position. This car is also a pleasure to drive, with the sole upgrade being Racing Soft Tires for maximum grip. The interior feels like you want to drive this car. And, if you’re a testosterone freak like I am, this is the right car for you. There is a steady amount of torque throughout the RPM band and this brings steady acceleration all the way to the rev limiter in 5th gear.

Driving this car on a track will leave you with endless fun. Yes, you have five speeds I know, that’s one rea-son this car is bonkers. This car has around 500 BHP and is a dream to drive. The cornering ability of this machine is immense compared to something else of its caliber. Not that there is anything else of its caliber in existance, exept other SLRs.


Technical DataBrake Horsepower 597 HP/6500 RPMTorque 558 ft-lb/3000 RPM0-60 3.293 Seconds0-100 7.526 SecondsPrice* 634,500 GT Credits

*Price is determined with the base price of the car with the ad-dition of any modifications including any engine tuning, weight reduction, suspension upgrades etc.**- **See Glossary of Upgrade Conversions.


Which 2013 NASCAR Looks the Best and Why

Words: Nick

Bernow, Ian

Adams


Words: Nick Bernow, Ian Adams

Now, being NASCAR fans has been tough as of late. This is due to the fact that NASCAR has been on the fritz with safety and the theory of a “driver cocoon” , more or less a safety compartment in the cabin of the car to help prevent injury. The idea came about after the death of Dale Earnhardt Sr. (may he rest in peace) during the Daytona 500 in 2001. In 2006 the so-called Car Of Tomorrow (or COT) was developed to provide better safety. Since its development, fans have complained that the COT looks too uniform, that there was no distinguish between the makes in NASCAR. In response, NASCAR is releasing new cars for 2013. These new cars are, by some, to be considered a step backwards. They still have all of the strict safety standards, but you can actually look at them and say, yes that is a Ford Fusion or a Toyota Camry. Dodge has made the decision to pull out of NASCAR. Chevy just released their entry fleet and it looks like an actual car as well. Chevy has confirmed that whatever they will bring to NASCAR will be called the SS and be sold as a production model. First, we will start with editor Nick Bernow.

So the first car up for my evaluation is the Toyota Camry. Now, my overall opinion of a Japanese brand in NASCAR is that it should not be there, but it is, so let’s get to the car. The production Camry underwent a slight facelift in 2013 with an added piece to the front fascia, as well as a “tummy tuck” in car terms, add-ing a slight weight loss to the sides by getting rid of some useless details like a side skirt. The NASCAR equivalent shares these characteristics by losing the boxyness of the COT chassis and replacing it with a more showroom like quality to it. Yes, it is a Toyota, but, as a NASCAR, it is nice to see a showroom like car. Rank#4

Now before we move on, cue the groans, here comes the Ford Fusion. Now I know, it’s a Ford, GET OVER IT. Now, the new production Fusion underwent a major facelift. It had a major weight loss over the last year. The front has been smashed to pieces and replaced with an Ashton Martin style grille and front fascia, and the rear of the car also had a major tuck by reducing clutter on the rear deck as well as add-ing certain “sportiness” qualities to it. I think with the freedom to create a production looking car has led Ford to creating something worthy of contention. Rank #3

Let’s move on to Chevy. With their sprawling empire spanning every continent, they were bound to find something in their massive lineup to combat Ford and Toyota. They found it in Australia in the Holden lineup. The Commodore is the venerable sports sedan used all over the world in various competitions in motorsports, most notably, the V8 Supercar Championship. This car is coming to NASCAR and man does it look stunning. It got a minor facelift because Chevy redesigned the grille. In America, it is called the SS and the production car will debut at Speedweeks at Daytona in 2013. Rank #2

Now, Dodge did pull out of NASCAR, but they made a car before they left, so lets take a look. Now, the Charger COT looked the most awkward because it was anything that the box of the COT was not, it has flowing lines and Dodge was able to capture this in the new COT. It looks a lot like its road going counter-part. It is a shame that they pulled out, I would have liked to see this on the track. Rank #1

Overall I think this will be a good refresh for the good of NASCAR. According to the teams at the track, there have been good testing results. I think that the Chevy will look the best on the track, seeing as how Dodge has pulled out of contention and the Ford looks like an Ashton Martin sedan.


And now for the comments of our other staff writer Ian Ad-amsFord- When I first saw the car I thought, “Man they took an Aston Martin, and squashed it.” I mean, just look at the grill section. Look familiar to anyone else? On second look though the cars grown on me… slightly, I’m not going to say it looks good, but it’s not terrible either. Final Verdict: 3rd Toyota- WHY!? No, not why is Toyota in NASCAR, why does their car suck so much this year. I know the answer already, because they’re working off a Camry, but still, could have made it look a bit better. I have hated this car since I first saw it and it has not, nor will it ever grow on me. Final Verdict: 4th (like there was a chance it wasn’t.) Dodge-Look at it, look at it and bow down, this car is excellent, the design is great and it will be a great competitor this year…. Wait, what? It’s not running? What do you mean Dodge and Penske screwed around too much to get a contract done? Ugh, fine, what’s next, Penske running Fords?.... Oh god I give up. NEXT! Final Verdict: 1st* Chevy- Again excellent looking car and I am partial to my Chevy’s, now the car does have a couple issues, first off, the unveil was held until AFTER the last week of the season. Granted that’s not what this is about but still, and second of all, the other two, (I’m not counting the Camry) have actual grills, not stickers like the Chevy. End of case better than the ford and Toyota but worse than the dodge. Final verdict: 2nd

So there you have it. Now this of course means nothing because the perfor-mance and driver talent will take over when the actual season starts. However, I think if I have to make a season prediction, anyone but Dodge has a shot. *If it was competing.


Honda NSX Vs. Nissan Skyline GTR: Which Japanese Supercar is Better?

Words & Photos By Nick Bernow


As we look into a new automotive world, one classic rivalry may be rekindled. The rivalry between Honda and Nissan is one that originates in the 1990s. Honda’s NSX and Nissan’s Skyline GTR went at it in the JGTC(later known as Super GT) as well as other forms of racing. The cars had very different body shapes. The GTR is a sports coupe while the NSX is a mid engine powerhouse that wanted to compete with the Ferraris and Lambos. These cars are in Gran Tourismo , and we wanted to find out which was better.

Just looking at them, you can instantly see that the GTR is the proper looking car, with lines that say “commuter car” while the NSX says, I want to go fast, and not care what people say about me. Both of these cars run on 6 cylinder engines and have a nice, pitchy noise to them. These cars then are two of the “budget supercars” that take the world by storm. So, how are they to drive?

Quite good actually, however there is a big difference in driving style needed to control these cars. The GTR is a rear biased four-wheel drive system while the NSX is a mid engine, rear wheel drive monster. The difference is quite shocking actually. The GTR always has a tendency to “push” or go wide in a corner because of the way the power is mapped. The NSX on the other hand, has so much power and no four-wheel drive, so the result is that you get immense oversteer, or too much power and not enough grip.

So, my opinion you ask? Both of these cars are spectacular on the quality front, both sound really good, and both have different driving styles. However; they do have their differences. The main difference is that with the GTR, the feeling is just so planted it pretty much sells the car. The catch is that you have to know what the car is going to do way ahead of time berfore you actually do it. the NSX you kind of have to just point it and tell it where to go ond hope it goes there. Both of these cars will get you to your destina-tion , however many pieces the NSX will get you there in is yet to be seen. Ayrton Senna even had imput on how it drives, according to him, the original setup wasn’t as loose as to how he wanted it, it was too tight in other words, so Honda lossened up the suspension. The result is the car we got. My advice would be this, pick the one that best suits your driving style and abilities and you will be very satisfied. I guaran-tee it.



iRacing: What is It and How Does It Work?

Words: Nick Bernow Photos: Ian Adams


iRacing is a different type of racing simulator. Instead of focusing on graphics, it focuses on physics. The tracks are laser scanned so you can feel every bump in the surface. For example, Daytona Interna-tional Speedway, before it was repaved, was extremely bumpy, almost too bumpy to tolerate. After they repaved the track in real life, they scanned it again and released it to the iRacing community. The differ-ence was that there were no bumps in the surface, or bumps that are easy to manage. Using this scanning, the cars are also realistic. You would think that these cars are hard to drive, but some are not. The compe-tition is based solely based on two things: Safety Rating, and iRating.

Safety Rating and iRating are based on how clean you race while in official races. Official races have set rules defined by the Sporting Code, or the official iRacing rulebook. Your iRating determines what split or category of drivers you are in. Rookies do not have iRating, but do have Safety Rating to worry about. The higher the iRating, the higher the split you are in. What this means is the racing will be cleaner the higher you progress through the ranks. The highest license you can obtain is an A grade.

There are many different cars to choose from to race in iRacing. On the oval side, you start with a car called the Street Stock. This car is the car you start with and it shows. The handling is sluggish and the tracks are easy to master. The racing is not the cleanest here, the lowest splits have the rookies in it so rac-ing clean here is next to impossible.

The next car in the lineup is the National car. it is based on the 2009 Nationwide Series car. is based on the Chevrolet Impala. It handles a little better, and runs on slightly larger tracks than the Street Stock. By this time you are out of the Rookie class so usually the racing gets closer and cleaner. Instead of winning the race from the pole, you actually have to fight for it. You might win from here on out by sec-onds or only a nose.

As you progress, the cars get faster and more agile. When you reach a B license, you get to drive the Class B Chevrolet Impala. This is the same car used in the NASCAR Nationwide Series races. The races here are extremely close with drivers pushing to the edge of all possible in terms of grip. The races are usually decided by noses of cars and milliseconds between them. The drivers are always on edge and emotions run high.

Other than the official races, players on a regular basis participate in unofficial races and unofficial leagues. The leagues feature was added about two months ago, allowing the league organizer to schedule races in advance, use a point system, and use different regulations such as a fixed setup and how much fuel you are allowed to put into the car at one time.

This simulator isn’t graphics intensive in the same sense that Gran Tourismo is. That isn’t the rea-son it exists. It exists to give the real world drivers time to practice, learn new tracks, and have fun. It also gives the enthusiasts a chance to see what it is like to drive on real tracks and see how tough it really is.



Words: Nick Bernow

Photos: Nick Bernow & Ian Adams

As you know, most of these photos that we took over the course of our project have been taken out of the respective simulators that we use. However; some are easier to get than oth-ers. For example, GT5’s photomode allows you to take pictures with a realistic camera in game. From the photo album in game, you export them to your PS3 and put them on a USB drive to put them on your computer. iRacing on the other hand does not have a wonderful camera feature. To take screenshots of iRacing, you have to download the application FRAPS. FRAPS is the leading game screenshot/video capture program. You have to load up your replay in iRacing and play the replay while using the FRAPS application. If done correctly you get shots like this:

LAST PAGE: OUR PHOTOS AND HOW WE GOT THEM.

These shots take time and are some-times really hard to get, a lot of times, we had to go back through and sometimes run things again to get the perfect shot. It was extremely frustrating. I think they came out good though and I’m welcome to hearing opinions on this.



GT: The Automotive Magazine

Documents

words photos nick bernowslr

scottish rally championship

wrc drivers championship

rally new zealand

nascar sprint cup championship

subaru wrt

later career colin

new ford focus rally