The dream will soon become a reality for GT Academy Middle East winner Ahmed Khaled, who will undergo an intensive training programme before making his racing debut with Nissan Nismo at the Dubai 24 Hours race in January 2015.
The 25-year-old engineer from Saudi Arabian beat four other regional finalists – Jamal Ghandour, Hadi Abdel El Hadi, Waleed Al Ghamdi and Yasser Al Mansour – for the prize at the GT Academy International Race Camp at Silverstone in the UK.
Having qualified for the camp with impressive times recorded in PlayStation video game Gran Turismo at the regional finals in Dubai, Khaled stepped up a gear in a series of driving and fitness challenges.
The gruelling six-day camp – featuring 27 international competitors from Australia, India, Mexico, Thailand and the Middle East – separated the men from the boys, with one person from each region eliminated after each challenge.
The series of challenges included a tough military-style fitness test and driving sessions with the ‘Mud Mayhem’ assault course, ‘Nissan Micra Stock Car’ racing, the ‘Traffic Challenge’ in the GT-R and the ‘Dirt Track’ time trial in the Juke.
After beating El Hadi in the head-to-head Gymkhana, Buggy Racing challenge, Khaled, behind the wheel of a Nissan 370Z, finished fourth in the final ‘Dogfight’ eight-lap race and was placed fourth overall in the international competition.
Khaled couldn’t believe his luck after winning the competition, and now follows in the footsteps of last year’s champion, Qatar’s Salman Al Khater.
He said: “I don’t know what to say because I just cannot believe that I have won and that I’ll be coming back to Silverstone in two weeks’ time to start my new dream.
“This is definitely beyond what I imagined. Since I was very small, I have always had this dream of becoming a racing driver and now I’m just living my dream.”
“I have to be ready mentally because my life is going to change from now on.” added Khaled, who plans to quit his job as a civil engineer. “I just want to race forever and want to do everything out there in the motoring world – Formula One, 24 hours – anything with four wheels I want to do it.”
Middle East judge and rallly driver Abdo Feghali, who announced Khaled as the champion, praised the Saudi Arabian. “Khaled proved that he was good – physica-lly and behind the wheel,” he said. “Especially the last two days, he really surprised us all and he has got an opportunity with Nissan to do the Dubai 24 Hours,”
Asked how far he could go in the sport, Feghali said: “It all depends on his determination and belief inside himself. And the support he’s going to get. As a gift, Nissan Middle East have given him a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do the 24 hours and I hope he can achieve some good results.”
