Grand Valley... 1000km or 24 Hours?

Since Gran Turismo 1, the Grand Valley 300km has been the premier endurance of Gran Turismo racing. Evidence of this can be found in just the simple fact that this track is the signature course of the Gran Turismo series. I would prefer this race be run with Le Mans Prototypes and GT cars than mostly high-end sports cars. While the 300km is a lovely race, imagine if Polyphony Digital wanted to try something new to spice up the race.

--- Concept: Grand Valley 1000km ---

Take the 300km race, and just tack on 700 more kilometers. A race that lasts about two hours and thirty minutes now lasts longer. This would make the race almost seven or eight hours long. The race could start in the afternoon and go into sunset (or even the late evening).

--- Concept: 24 Hours of Grand Valley ---

Twice around the clock. Day-to-night-to-day. This is the ultimate test of any true sportscar racing event. How well can you (and your team) withstand 24 hours of punishing driving? The sun getting into your eyes can also be a factor. While this is only a video game, I'm just showing you the real-life challenges of 24-hour racing.

Is Grand Valley a suitable venue for 24 hours of racing and with a maximum of 16 cars to a track? Absolutely. How do I know? Well, for rFactor, I simulated a 24-hour race in rFactor using the Sports Car Challenge mod for rFactor. I made sure to include both prototypes and GT cars. And while the rFactor model was more based on the GT1 and GT2 versions of Grand Valley, it was still Grand Valley. Prototypes could lap in the 1:40 range while the best GT cars could fall just under 2:00 laps. Imagine this track come to life if we do get transitions from day to night. Imagine fireworks going off in the crowd as it's night. Imagine the darkness of night giving way to the morning light. This is one of the great challenges of racing 24 hours. Grand Valley, at least among fictional courses, would fit the bill as the premier Gran Turismo endurance for a 24-hour endurance.





I was planning on doing a Gran Turismo blog entry about your dream endurances, but if you could choose to have a longer endurance race at Grand Valley Speedway, which would you take- a 1000km race or a 24-hour race?