The last Nissan gamer-racer still standing

Few things highlight Nissan's radical changes for 2019 better than the decision to drop its own racing legend Satoshi Motoyama. The 47-year-old was a veteran of almost 20 years with the manufacturer, remaining on its books even after he was sidelined from NISMO's Super GT operation to a weaker Nissan squad amid declining form in '13.

No matter which way you cut it, Nissan was ruthless and dropped a loyal driver who had earned it four Super Formula titles and three Super GT crowns.

That cull has gone far beyond the shores of Japan too. Lucas Ordonez, Nissan's early shining light that vindicated its GT Academy gamer-to-driver programme, was dropped after 10 years with the manufacturer.

Earlier this month, the RJN squad that gave a platform to GT Academy winners and worked with Nissan for 20 years also made an exit, and partnered with 2009 Formula 1 champion Jenson Button and Honda in the Blancpain GT Series.

On the face of it, those decisions were the cutting of the final remnants of the GT Academy that quietly ended in 2017, but in the announcement of Nissan's '19 motorsport programme there was a notable last man standing.

Jann Mardenborough, comfortably the most high-profile winner of the GT Academy, remained with Nissan in a new move to Kondo Racing for the 2019 Super GT season.

Mardenborough hadn't really hit his stride until his second year in the category in 2018, when he notably dominated the second Fuji round before a loose pipe ended his victory hopes. A messy race at Sugo - for reasons outside of Mardenborough's control - was another chance gone when he could've won.

He missed out on continuing his other Japanese programme in Super Formula for 2018, despite talks, and his last action in the series was to take one of the poles at the Suzuka season finale - ahead of the likes of Pierre Gasly - before tsunami weather cancelled the races.

The move to Kondo for the 2019 GT season is on the face of it a step down from the strong Impul squad, but Mardenborough is confident the switch to a new tyre in Yokohama will pay off - Super GT has a tyre war - and he believes Kondo is improving.

Regardless, at a time when motorsport Esports continues to gather pace and shout about its success stories, Mardenborough is now one of the last remnants of the GT Academy platform that undoubtedly helped spark the Esports revolution.

"The talent at the end of the day got him to his position" Darren Cox on Jann Mardenborough

"In terms of being the last man standing, it's sad," Mardenborough tells Autosport. "The circumstances within Nissan and GT Academy, there's only a certain amount of seats available, and it's well known there was a massive prune of everyone in the last few months and not only in terms of GT Academy but in drivers like Lucas.

"I don't look into it too deeply as being the last guy standing. My job now is that I'm a professional driver so I want to be a pro with a manufacturer for as long as possible.

"For example Satoshi announced his retirement [but remains a Nissan advisor], there was a ceremony for him. He's a legend at NISMO so if I can have a career as fruitful as his and as long as his with a manufacturer, that's the target. That's my personal goal.

"I just hope that in the future there's more opportunities for gamers to become drivers."

That future will be without GT Academy, although Autosport understands a spiritual successor is being worked on outside of Nissan. This feature isn't going to delve into the well-trodden history of the GT Academy either, but you can remind yourself of that in Andrew van de Burgt's retrospective from last year.

What Mardenborough does represent is the increasingly blurred lines between the virtual and real worlds of motorsport, even more so as the first to bridge the gap and really be noticed by the mainstream.

Earlier this year there was another milestone achievement for motorsport gaming when Lando Norris and Max Verstappen teamed up to take on the Bathurst 12 Hours for their virtual Team Redline squad, joining touring car racer Nicky Catsburg and Supercars icon Shane van Gisbergen. To further reinforce the point, Rudy van Buren - winner of World's Faster Gamer and now a McLaren simulator driver - was also on the roster.

Eight years after Mardenborough took headlines as the GT Academy winner - bolstered by Fleet Street highlighting his upbringing and ESPN producing a documentary - motorsport gaming hit the mainstream once again.

It hasn't ended there either, with a high-profile director potentially turning Mardenborough's life into a film in what is fast becoming the golden era of motorsport gaming.

"He's high-profile because he's British, he's mixed race, which is a great story and there's the Lewis [Hamilton] link, so it allowed us to go out and tell a story to the English-speaking media," says Darren Cox, Mardenborough's manager and former GT Academy supremo.

"The talent at the end of the day got him to his position and of course there's been other people, manufacturers, knocking at the door for his talent not because he's the gamer guy.

"He's been very loyal to Nissan because he wouldn't be where he is without them. Good luck to him for having that loyalty to stick with them."

Since GT Academy there hasn't been another driver to follow the career path of Mardenborough. Take F1 Esports champion Brendon Leigh - his titles have increased his profile and the well-run Mercedes outfit is improving him in all aspects. But he is not outright targeting a racing career.

Van Buren at McLaren is a simulator driver, while established racers such as Norris complement their careers with simulation titles in proper racing rigs.

Impressing in a prototype defined Mardenborough's early career path

Mardenborough's approach was always going to be different when you look at his career path after "pure luck" got him into trying the GT Academy event on Gran Turismo 5, and he began piling in anywhere between five to nine hours of practice in one car on the same track in monotonous fashion.

"I happened to be in the right place at the right time in my life and with no distractions," says Mardenborough. "All my friends were travelling to find themselves in Thailand or Australia or whatever.

"I'd played for fun until that point and this wasn't fun, it was monotonous as I just wanted to get to the top 20 [to make the real-life shootout]. I did it and the process went from there in various rounds to make the finals at Silverstone and winning it."

When it came to his immediate ability in the real world, Cox remembers receiving a phone call about Mardenborough's promise as soon as the gamer hit the real-world driving aspects.

"The regional UK series was at Brands Hatch around the car park basically and the instructor called up and said 'I've got your winner here'," he recalls.

"What we didn't do was look at who was quickest. It was the progression, we did a benchmark test at the beginning, but then it's the curves and the one you want is the one catching the guy who's already done a bit of karting or his dad's paid for track days."

Cox says "Jann was definitely head and shoulders above in terms of talent" in his year, but that in a GT3 car "it would be pretty close" between him, Ordonez and Wolfgang Reip.

But he adds: "When you put Jann in a prototype it's a different story."

Impressing in a prototype defined Mardenborough's early career path. Cox says he always has a crucial moment with gamers turning professional in which he calls on them to decide what they want from their future: Racer or gamer?

Mardenborough doesn't recall having such a conversation, but said he knew his targets early on.

"For me, it was always [wanting to become a] professional racing driver," he says. "It really hit me hard actually during the finals because it was seven days, no gaming involved, it was pure instructions, challenges and in-car stuff.

"The first two days we were at Le Mans [in 2011] and we were there for a few days to see Lucas race. I'm standing on the grid with these other 11 competitors and I see Lucas and he's standing next to these pro team-mates in his race suit in an LMP2 car. He's in the biggest race in the world.

"I thought, 'Wow this guy two years ago was me where I am now. He's a gamer at the biggest race'.

"It was the moment that will always stick with me in my mind as something being possible. I hadn't considered it until then, I just knew of the prize. I went hard! I didn't care about anything else, I was like a blinkered horse.

"I said to the instructors, 'All my eggs are in this basket and it's all or nothing'. I didn't want to think about losing or going home. It was too unbearable at that point.

"I made a stupid decision to put him in GP3 when he should have had another year in F3" Darren Cox

"I'd had the forbidden fruit, driving a GT-R around Silverstone as a 19-year-old, it was sick!"

GT3 became his career staple following his finals win, notably leading to a ban on Academy gamers from competing in British GT in 2013 after he and Alex Buncombe came too close to winning the Pro-Am title.

Cox claims it was a compromise agreed between series bosses and Nissan, which led to Mardenborough and the GT Academy drivers using the Blancpain series instead. Then there was the unplanned detour into single-seaters.

It was never on the radar of Cox and Mardenborough until Jonathan Buncombe - father of Chris and Alex - told Cox to explore the opportunity, leading to a tie-up with Carlin.

"Trevor Carlin said I was crazy but he stuck him in the car," Cox said. "He was supposed to do either British or European F3, and Trevor did both for the budget of one.

"Jann did Blancpain GT3, British and European F3 on a big learning curve. At Spa he was racing [Antonio] Giovinazzi and in the rain, Giovinazzi stopped and Jann went over the top of him."

Cox credits team boss Carlin with encouraging Mardenborough to get back behind the wheel after the crash played on his mind, even going as far as to organise a staged "shakedown" that meant Mardenborough had to get in the cockpit. But then there was the GP3 switch.

"I made a stupid decision to put him in GP3 when he should have had another year in F3, I got lulled into the 'more coverage, on the grand prix package' and he wasn't ready," Cox says, a sentiment Mardenborough agrees with.

"He probably would have won F3 the following season. GP3 was my fault."

But regardless of who's to blame, Mardenborough used the disappointment to launch himself into a paid career in Japan. Now sharing a flat with fellow driver Nick Cassidy and entrenched in Japan, you could forgive Mardenborough for wanting to distance himself from his gaming roots to perhaps be taken more seriously. Don't forget that when Ordonez won GT Academy, there were some who were concerned a gamer would be too dangerous on track and must be avoided.

Far from distancing himself, if anything Mardenborough wants to race virtually more often.

"Compared to when I first started, it's way less! I've requested an actual proper sim rig built so I can do some iRacing races," he says.

"I watch a load of YouTubers, the racing gamers, and I watch it genuinely for hours on the TV!

"I love the sim racing aspect of it and there are some YouTubers who are super entertaining and I want to get into that again. Previously it's just been on the PlayStation when I lived back home, but I want to get a PC and do some iRacing and rFactor type stuff."

He may even race other virtual drivers who want to follow his career path, which as it stands looks to be a one-off.

Asked if there can be another GT Academy, Mardenborough says: "It's possible but it's whether any company or manufacturer wants to be behind it 100% and not as a marketing gimmick.

"It would have to be people from GT Academy because you would be a fool to start up from scratch and try to do the same thing.

"BMW is choosing their next junior driver [partly] through a simulator test, but it's only drivers in their customer cars. It's madness, come on! There's a huge pool of people who have the skills.

"If they wanted to be a professional, they'll be as much as competitor to a junior driver or customer driver than somebody else. People are not doing it right man, there's so much opportunity for manufacturers to really expand their talent."

The last high-profile gamer-to-driver has spoken, but will any manufacturer listen?