Back in April a factory assault on the Nordschleife saw the Nissan GT-R set a new fastest lap. The new time, set late in the month, was an impressive 7 minutes 26.70 seconds. This marked a slight improvement over their earlier effort in mid-April.

However, the press statement announcing this grand news was only released about a week ago. So I decided to wait until the middle of the Nürburgring 24 hour race to post up the news. I thought that would be the best way to get something related to the GT-R online while the N24 action was underway.

You see, I am guessing that I am probably not the only one that finds the absence of the headline chasing GT-R at the Ring this weekend a little bit “interesting”. Gun shy perhaps? Made more ironic by the fact the Radio Le Mans broadcast of the N24 race is being sponsored by the new Nissan 370Z.

Award-Winning Nissan GT-R Achieves New Record Time at Nurburgring Circuit

The NISSAN GT-R, winner of the 2009 World Performance Car of the Year, improved its lap time at the renowned Nurburgring Nordschleife circuit in late April in Germany to 7min 26 seconds 70.

Previous recorded lap times at the ‘Ring’ were:

• 7 minutes 27 seconds 56 on April 15 2009
• 7 minutes 29 in April 2008
• 7 minutes 38 in September 2007

“This record demonstrates our commitment to the continuous evolution of the Nissan GT-R,” says Kazutoshi Mizuno, Chief Vehicle Engineer and Chief Vehicle Specialist. “We would like to continue delivering the passion and pride of ownership to our customers by improving its performance every year.”

The Nissan GT-R has won more than a dozen awards globally including Car of the Year from CAR Magazine in the UK and Car of the Year by both Motor Trend and Automobile Magazine in the US.

The Nissan GT-R benefits from a strong image and heritage amongst performance car aficionados, especially in Australia which was the only country globally to officially retail the previous R32 in the early nineties.

The R35 GT-R was launched in Australia, Europe, GCC and New Zealand last month.

More than 170 GT-R’s have been ordered by Australian customers so far.

In Japan more than 5,900 GT-R’s have been sold up to March 2009. It went on sale in the US in July 2008 where 2,100 have also been sold so far.

The new, record Nurburgring lap was again set by Nissan Chief test driver Toshio Suzuki who visited Australia in February for the car’s official launch. The blistering lap time was achieved on Dunlop tyres in dry but dusty conditions.

A collection of automotive magazine editors, including Car (UK) were present to witness the historic GT-R lap record.