Don't look now, but two of our favorite recent motorsports stories are combining into one peanut butter/chocolate mecha of total dominance. Nissan just announced the DeltaWing race car will compete in the U.S. under command of none other than Gran Turismo Academy racer Lucas Ordoñez later this year.
The Nissan-powered Deltawing looks like a rocket but actually propels itself around the competition with a tiny four-cylinder engine. It gets its speed from a mixture of low weight and clever engineering, which means fewer pitstops for tires and fuel. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough to keep it on the track earlier this year when it was bumped off by a Toyota.
Now Nissan wants to try its hand again at endurance racing by entering it in Petit Le Mans — the American Le Mans Series finale at Road Atlanta in October. It's only 10 hours instead of 24 (thus the Petite) but it's still a challenging course.
Because the drivers of the DeltaWing are all pursuing other commitments, Nissan racing is turning over the car to Spanish student/Gran Turismo gamer Lucas Ordoñez, who won Nissan's GT Academy online race and has proven himself to be a strong racer in non-virtual reality.
Ordoñez will be joined by 2011 ALMS PC class champion Gunnar Jeannette racing an "unclassified" entry. This means it won't necessarily compete in any class but will instead race against the whole field. Depending on how it goes, the new car could race a full season in 2013.
We like this on so many levels.