Advancing technology blurs the line between virtual and real-world driving as today's champions practice on television screens.
When I suggested to Kazunori Yamauchi — creator of the "Gran Turismo" video game — that he codrive with me in his first ever "real world" race, a one-hour Mazda MX-5 endurance event at Tsukuba Circuit in Ibaraki Prefecture in 2006, he vacillated for a day or so. Despite being a very good driver, he said no one had ever invited him to join a real race before.
But getting Yamauchi into a racing car was a lot easier than what he went through to get his game off the ground. "Understandably, I hit a few brick walls in the beginning," he says.