News just to hand, direct from Nissan, that a standard R35 GT-R has lapped the Nürburgring Nordschleife in 7 minutes, 29 seconds. Recorded on April 16 and 17, the GT-R used was a base specification car and fitted with the standard Japanese market tyres. Driven by GT-R chief test driver Tochio Suzuki, this latest lap time beats the previous fastest time for the GT-R by an astounding nine seconds.

The previous best lap time for GT-R of 7:38, also driven by Suzuki, was one of the fastest laps achieved by a production car despite conditions being slightly damp on two corners.

“At last year’s testing, we were frustrated by the conditions at the Nürburgring, always believing that the GT-R could go under 7 minutes 30 seconds,” said Kazutoshi Mizuno, Chief Vehicle Engineer for GT-R. “Below 7 minutes 30 seconds, the GT-R proves it is among the fastest mass-production cars in the world. We set out to build a multi-performance supercar accessible to anyone, anytime and anywhere – I believe the GT-R has delivered that promise.”

Keep in mind, the V-spec version of the GT-R is still under development, but there have been unofficial timed laps of around 7 minute 25 seconds. Already the standard GT-R is ahead of some impressive cars, recently released Porsche GT2 is just one example, if the V-spec can post a solid improvement over the regular car, then that should place it ahead of some of the world’s most desirable supercars, including the Pagani Zonda F Clubsport and the Porsche Carrera GT.

Read a list of reported lap times on Wikipedia.

(Thanks to Peter for the tip on this news.)