'Gran Turismo' creator drives 25hr race

Gran Turismo creator Kazunori Yamauchi has reportedly completed a 25-hour endurance race around a track in California.

Yamauchi was taking part in an event at the Thunder Hill Raceway near the US city of Willows as part of the Spoon Sports racing team.

According to Kotaku, he shared the mammoth driving stint with a motoring journalist and two Japanese race car drivers.

"Not having a lot of experience in circuit driving, and not knowing what to expect in a 25-hour race, I was very relieved to find that I was able to reduce the 20-second gap between my laptimes and my teammates' at the beginning of the practice to almost zero at the start of the final race," Yamauchi explained.

"It was a great feeling to confirm first hand that Gran Turismo has a positive effect in not just learning specific tracks, but also in raising the level of driving technique in the drivers themselves."

Gran Turismo 5 will be released at some point next year, but a playable Time Trial demo is available now as part of the GT Academy competition.