These days every automaker and their mother is flogging their test mules on the Nurburgring, but one of the first cars to use its Green Hell lap time for development and marketing was the Nissan GT-R.
A quarter century ago, Nissan was set to re-introduce the Skyline GT-R, the twin-turbo AWD monster that took its moniker from the legendary sports sedan of the same name that dominated Japanese touring car racing in the late Sixties and early Seventies. By several accounts the 1989 GT-R broke the unofficial production car record, but its prowess was made official in 1995 when the GT-R clocked a 7:59, the first sub-eight-minute time for a street car and a record that stood for nearly a decade.
Nissan test driver Hiroyoshi Kato joined Nissan at age of 18. By 28, he was in charge of the GT-R’s suspension and dedicated the next 12 years of his life driving the Nurburgring over three generations of the GT-R. His expertise earned him the nickname Nissan’s Nurburgring Meister, a nod to the native language of Japan’s former Axis Power ally.
Now Kato is assisting in development of the latest GT-R NISMO, which set a record volume production car lap time last fall with a 7:08.679. However, at age of 55 Kato has taken the less intensive role of balancing the car’s drivability for both street and track use, jokingly calling himself “grandpa” while younger drivers like German GT1 champ Michael Krumm and Formula One driver Sebastien Buemi do the hard core lapping.
Still, Kato reveals that while it seemed like a monumental effort to break the eight-minute mark two decades ago, he was easily able to do his first time driving the GT-R NISMO. Watch Kato’s story in the video below.
Photo by Ben Hsu.
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