Brought to you by TheJudge13 Contributor Simon Termorshuizen

The FIA announced that it has started a partnership with the creators of the much acclaimed racing game Gran Turismo. To begin with the game will feature officially licensed FIA tracks, starting with four now and this number will increase in the future. For 2015 the partnership will include an official FIA Online Championship to offer the gamers a taste of real motor sport.

That this announcement was made a day before the start of the FIA Sport Conference in which the development of future motorsport is being discussed can hardly be seen as a coincidence. In F1 there are a lot of talk already about improving the show for the viewers at home and the spectators at the track. The declining number of viewers has led to a growing concern among drivers, teams and the FIA about what F1 is giving the audience in terms of show and competition. Although possible solutions from the teams vary from each other, the goal is certainly to keep attracting new and young fans to the world of motorsport.

It is also in this light that the partnership between Gran Turismo and the FIA must be seen. Nissan and Gran Turismo are already working together and they created a GT Academy in which gamers can compete amongst each other and in the end can win an actual professional driving career. That Nissan is taken this seriously can be seen in the fact that four past winners of the event were competing in Le Mans this year; two in the LM P2 class and two in the Nissan ZEOD RC, their revolutionary electric racer.

It now seems that FIA has seen the potential of this partnership and is planning to use the same idea to keep attracting young fans to the world of motorsport. For many of us the love for Formula 1 is being handed down from father to son or something like that. But the importance to attract new people cannot be underestimated and to do it with something they already love, like gaming, and also in an affordable fashion, is a smart idea.

If the FIA can manage to get the different classes and teams actively supporting this idea and make it a talent pool for a professional career, than the possibilities are limitless and the potential outcome can be a huge ‘new’ audience. Perhaps finally, after years of ignoring it, the FIA is embracing the new technologies to keep motorsport interesting for all ages instead of seeing those same technologies as a threat.

GT Academy – Go from this:

To this: