Kazunori Yamauchi
Yamauchi at the 30th International Automobile Festival in Paris, in 2015.
Born (1967-08-05) August 5, 1967
Kashiwa, Chiba, Japan
Occupations
EmployerPolyphony Digital
Notable workGran Turismo series

Kazunori Yamauchi (山内 一典, Yamauchi Kazunori, born August 5, 1967), nicknamed "Kaz", is a Japanese game designer and professional racing driver. He is CEO of Polyphony Digital and producer of the Gran Turismo video game series.[1]

Polyphony Digital

He became the president of Polyphony Digital after designing his first game Motor Toon Grand Prix, a cartoon-inspired racing title similar to Mario Kart. Motor Toon Grand Prix later spawned a sequel, Motor Toon Grand Prix 2, which was the only game in the franchise released outside Japan. Since then, Yamauchi has fulfilled his dream of creating realistic driving simulators with his massively successful Gran Turismo series. He has also expressed interest in broadening out to other game genres; in 1999 Polyphony Digital released Omega Boost, a shoot 'em up title set in space, which has since proven to be Yamauchi's only foray outside of racing game development.

As a result of Gran Turismo's success, Yamauchi has become an important figure in the worldwide automotive industry. Polyphony Digital worked with Nissan to design the multifunction display (which relays various pieces of car data to the driver, including G-Force generated, torque distribution and lap times) found in the R35 GT-R.[2] The car, as well as the display itself, appear in many games in his franchise, such as Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, Gran Turismo 5, Gran Turismo 6 and a newer, facelifted version of the car in Gran Turismo Sport and Gran Turismo 7. He was given a Nissan GT-R for his contribution.

On a video included with Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, Yamauchi remarked his favorite car design is the Ford GT and he owns two in real life.[3]

A documentary focusing on Gran Turismo and Yamauchi called Kaz: Pushing the Virtual Divide, was released on January 22, 2014 on Hulu.[4]

Racing career

On August 29, 2009, he joined the World Car Awards team participating the SP8 class in race 8 of VLN piloting a Lexus IS-F on the Nürburgring. He clocked a fastest lap of 10 minutes 9 seconds which is the best in the team, and their team recorded a class win.[5][6] He returned to the Nürburgring track as one of the 4 drivers of Team World Car Award participating in the 24 Hours of Nürburgring 2010 and finished in 4th place in SP8 class.

Kazunori Yamauchi also competed as one of the four drivers of the #96 Spoon Sports FD2 Honda Civic Type R during the 25 Hours of Thunderhill in 2009, which was his first time driving in a US road course. Their race was plagued by penalties such as having to modify the exhaust tip for exceeding noise regulations and a penalty for improper fueling, which forced the team to spend almost an hour in the pits.[7] The car itself didn't have any problems though, and placed 7th out of 17 cars in its class, and 23rd overall out of 66 cars, after completing 617 laps.[7][8]

Yamauchi took part in the 2011 24 Hours of Nürburgring as one of the four drivers of the #71 Schulze Motorsport Nissan GT-R N24. The team finished the race in 36th place overall, achieving a victory in the SP8T class after overcoming several technical problems, and beating competition from drivers including Johnny Herbert and Mark Blundell.[9][10][11]

For the 2012 24 Hours of Nürburgring, Yamauchi returned to Nissan, driving the #123 GT-R with Lucas Ordóñez. He finished 1st in the SP8T class, and 30th overall, though the SP8T class that year only consisted of two cars, both of them were Nissan GT-Rs.[12]

Yamauchi joined the SP9 class for the 2013 24 Hours of Nürburgring, driving Schulze Motorsport's Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3. Although the team managed to lead the first qualifying session overall for over 40 minutes, multiple reliability problems in the race put them down to 165th place overall at one point, but the team managed to recover to 135th position overall at the checkered flag.[13]

For the 2014 24 Hours of Nürburgring, Yamauchi again drove Schulze Motorsport's Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 with Jordan Tresson, Tobias and Michael Schulze. The team managed to have a much cleaner race than in 2013, and impressively finished 14th overall out of 165 cars.[14][15]

The 2016 Nürburgring 24 Hour race saw Yamauchi make the switch from Nissan to BMW, where he piloted the #101 Walkenhorst Motorsport M6 GT3, and finished 22nd overall.

Racing record

25 Hours of Thunderhill results

Year Team Co-Drivers Car Class Laps Pos. Class
Pos.
2009 Japan Spoon Sports Japan Naoki Hattori
Japan Tatsuru Ichishima
Japan Sam Mitani		 Honda Civic Type R (FD2) E0 617 23rd 7th

24 Hours of Nürburgring results

Year Team Co-Drivers Car Class Laps Pos. Class
Pos.
2010 Germany Team World Car Awards Japan Hideshi Matsuda
Australia Peter Lyon
United Kingdom Owen Mildenhall		 Lexus IS F SP8 127 59th 4th
2011 Germany Schulze Motorsport Germany Tobias Schulze
Germany Michael Schulze
Japan Yasuyoshi Yamamoto		 Nissan GT-R SP8T 134 36th 1st
2012 Germany Team GT Academy Spain Lucas Ordóñez
Germany Tobias Schulze
Japan Yasukichi Yamamoto		 Nissan GT-R SP8T 136 30th 1st
2013 Germany Schulze Motorsport Germany Tobias Schulze
Germany Michael Schulze
Germany Michael Krumm		 Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 SP9 48 135th 22nd
2014 Germany Schulze Motorsport Germany Tobias Schulze
Germany Michael Schulze
France Jordan Tresson		 Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 SP9 147 14th 11th
2016 Germany Walkenhorst Motorsport Finland Mathias Henkola
New Zealand George Richardson
Germany Max Sandritter		 BMW M6 GT3 SP9 121 22nd 18th

Honors

In 2013, Yamauchi had a street named in honor of him in the city of Ronda. Named "Paseo de Kazunori Yamauchi", the street snakes around the Parador de Ronda. According to Ronda's city mayor Maria de la Paz Fernandez Lobato, "There is no doubt that his work has a huge cultural resonance with people today. He has driven the racing game genre to new levels of realism and his creations are as much art as technology. Ronda’s association with Gran Turismo is also a reflection that our ancient city is a modern, vibrant place to live and very much part of the 21st century."[16]

In 2015, Yamauchi was awarded the "Grand Prize of Creativity" at the 30th International Automobile Festival in Paris, for his contributions to the automotive industry.[17]

In 2017, Yamauchi was awarded an honorary degree in vehicle engineering from University of Modena and Reggio Emilia.[18]

Yamauchi made a cameo in the 2023 film Gran Turismo, playing a sushi chef, with actor Takehiro Hira portraying a fictional version of the former.

References

  1. ↑ Interview mit Yamauchi Kazunori Archived 2011-08-29 at the Wayback Machine Spiegel Online (18. April 2008)
  2. ↑ Nissan GT-R Multifunction Display Looks Like a PlayStation Game Archived 2013-12-10 at the Wayback Machine Gizmodo (23 Oct 2007)
  3. ↑ "Car News - Latest Auto News, First Looks and First Drives". Archived from the original on 2012-04-26.
  4. ↑ Chan, Ken (16 January 2014). "KAZ: Pushing the Virtual Divide Premieres On Hulu 1/22". PlayStation Blog. Sony. Archived from the original on 20 January 2014. Retrieved 6 February 2014.
  5. ↑ "32. RCM DMV Grenzlandrennen Classes results". VLN. August 30, 2009. Archived from the original on September 27, 2009.
  6. ↑ "Kazunori Yamauchi, Class Winner in the Nürburgring 4 Hour Race". Gran Turismo official website. September 21, 2009. Archived from the original on September 25, 2009.
  7. 1 2 "Kazunori Yamauchi completes the "25 Hours of Thunder Hill"". gran-turismo.com. Archived from the original on 2019-11-02. Retrieved 2019-11-02.
  8. ↑ "2009 NASA 25 Hours of Thunderhill Results" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-11-02. Retrieved 2019-11-02.
  9. ↑ "Kazunori Yamauchi achieves a Class Victory in the Nürburgring 24 Hour Race". gran-turismo.com. Archived from the original on 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
  10. ↑ "2011 Overall Results" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
  11. ↑ "2011 Class Results" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
  12. ↑ http://www.24h-rennen.de/uploads/media/24h_RACE_PROVISIONAL_TOTAL.pdf%5B%5D
  13. ↑ "Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 Completes the Nürburgring 24 hour race in the SP9 Class May 22, 2013". gran-turismo.com. Archived from the original on 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
  14. ↑ "Nissan | Nissan Survives the Longest Night at the 24 Hours of Nürburgring". Archived from the original on 2014-07-22. Retrieved 2014-06-25.
  15. ↑ "Rise after Falling – Nurburgring 24H 2014". PIT STOP. 2014-07-24. Archived from the original on 2019-11-03. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
  16. ↑ "Street Named in Honor of Kazunori Yamauchi in Ronda, Spain". GTPlanet. December 4, 2013. Archived from the original on September 2, 2019. Retrieved September 2, 2019.
  17. ↑ "Kazunori Yamauchi Honored with Creativity Award at International Auto Festival". GTPlanet. January 28, 2015. Archived from the original on September 2, 2019. Retrieved September 2, 2019.
  18. ↑ "Magazine Unimore". www.magazine.unimore.it. Archived from the original on 2019-09-02. Retrieved 2019-09-02.
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