In this speedrun I am beating the simulation mode or "GT mode" as fast as possible. The game is considered as finished after winning the GT World Cup as this leads to a credits roll. In order to unlock the GT World Cup the Sunday, Clubman and GT Cup must be won beforehand. The strategy is winning all gold trophies of the International A license and using the Nismo 400R which is rewareded for this to beat the GT Cup right away. This skips buying a slow used car and wasting time with bad laptimes on the sunday cup using it. The reward for the GT Cup is a fast racing car, the Chaser LM which I use for all other cups. Compared to the cars faced at the World Cup the Chaser is pretty bad but just like winning the GT Cup with the Nismo 400R this challenge is not too hard for me. The huge challenge in this run is consistently beating the IA gold license tests as I have only a single attempt for each test. In the following section I try to explain how this is done:

How to drive the Griffith/Viper:

The best way to use these 2 is oversteering by braking late+steering in the corner on the entrance. However when the car enters the corner we do not countersteer or steer in but just release all controls and let the car drift like we wanted it to slide out of the corner. Instead the car will automatically slide into the corner. As soon as that happens we react depending on how things turn out. We start to accerelate/steer-in or tap the gas if the traction is low to regain control to make it move around. Only if the brake was hit far too late we have to countersteer. This mostly COSTS time. Some further notes:

IA-1 High Speed Ring Gold Time: 1:03.9

Basically this one is just wall sliding. It is important that the car hits the wall late and frontal as this speeds up the car at this game. Many corners will cause a license fail when crashed frontally but these do not. Corner 2 and 3 and the final corner are worth sliding. Crashing corner 2 wall needs some countersteer to avoid spinning. 1:03.3 is easy here.

IA-2 Special Stage Route 5 Gold Time: 1:26.3

Although wall sliding is possible here, too this one is most likely to destroy your run as the time is pretty close. Corner 1 can be slided quite frontally but with care as it can cause a disqualify. Corner 3 must be drifted against. This is the usual way to crash walls on licenses as it will never disqualify you if the back of the car is turned towards the wall before hitting it. Corner 6 does not give a better line with wall sliding but there is a weird speed up doing so. Corner 7 is another drift slide, but with care it can easily spin. My best here is 1:24.9

IA-3 Grand Valley Speedway Gold Time: 1:57.8

Only one wall slide in the long tunnel, difficult corners, still very easy as the laptime is just not set very close.

IA-4 Deep Forest Gold Time: 1:18.8

This is an easy 1:17. We just have to avoid missing the apex too often.

IA-5 Autumn Ring Gold Time 1:20.2

This one has no wall slide but breaking early on the close corners in the beginning and cutting over the curbes will save good time. Only the long corner after the downhill part must be taken with countersteer. We steer and brake once we are already in the corner and countersteer to avoid spinning. This is basically a very easy 1:19, I did 1:18 already.

IA-6 Trial Mountain Gold Time 1:28.4

If we survived Special Stage this one will kick us out instead. Corner 3 and the one with the arrows after the tunnel are worth sliding, we do not get much more help. It is important on all of the corners after that to avoid hitting the curbes too much. A single flaw here and we are out.

IA-7 Special Stage 11 Gold Time 2:06.4

Super easy but always scary. Wall sliding is the word here but there are some passages where we can get stuck. Precise steering is the key here.

IA-8 Grand Valley II Gold Time 1:55.5

Grand Valley again. Once more the gold time is very friendly so we can only beat ourselves. On corner two we spin the car 180 degree and hit the gras and the wall with the back of the car. It looks dangerous but really is not. It is important NOT to slide in the long tunnel this time but in the short one. Also when sliding the car must be turned a little to avoid disqualification. 1:53 is my best here.