What's the news?
Nissan's in-house tuning arm Nismo (Nissan Motorsport, see what they did there?) doesn't rest on its laurels. The dust has barely settled on the launch of the revised 2017 GT-R, but its already been over it with a fine-tooth comb in an attempt to pull yet more performance out of ''Godzilla''. The changes focus on massaging the improvements made to the new standard model, with elements like the stiffer body structure allowing the Nismo engineers to work some chassis magic.
That rigidity increase has allowed tweaks to the shocks, springs and anti-roll bars, and with the active Bilstein DampTronic system performing its wizardry this allows an increase in grip and manoeuvrability over the regular car. The 3.8-litre V6 engine now utilises a brace of larger turbos half-inched from the GT3-class racer, and the hand-built unit still pushes out a faintly ridiculous 592hp and 652Nm of torque. Coupled with the electronically-controlled AWD system, you can reach 100km/h in 2.6 seconds from standstill and go all the way up to 315km/h. The police helicopter overhead may ensure that you do it just the once however...
Externally, the eagle-eyed will spot a larger front grille and some canards, which they claim has resulted in the car having more downforce than any other Nissan production car to date. Harder to spot but no less impressive is the fact that the front bumper assembly is now made from carbon-fibre, and additional reinforcement in the bonnet structure is claimed to prevent deformation at high speeds, which is always useful for those Autobahn V-max runs.
Inside, an Alcantara-trimmed dash and seat inserts, carbon-fibre centre console and the existing 2017 improvements make the cabin a nicer place to be, with the steering-mounted paddles (as opposed to dash-mounted on the older car) and smoother gearchanges promised by the recalibrated DCT sure to enhance the already hugely impressive driving experience. As normal, you can expect the Nismo car to carry a hefty premium over the standard model, but what value can you put on the ability to annihilate pretty much every supercar available in your humble Datsun?