Gran Turismo 5 demo races to PSN on December 17

2004: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy comes to an end (winning 11 Academy Awards in the process), John Kerry runs for US President and whales explode. Oh, and Gran Turismo 4 releases on PS2.

Five years later, the public is finally able to get their hands on Gran Turismo 5 with the first non-Prologue demo. The downloadable demo will be available on both the European and American PSN on December 17th.

In Europe, the demo will allow players to enter the "GT Academy Time Trial" contest, in which the top 20 players from select countries will be eligible for a chance to enter the GT Academy. The GT Academy training program will prepare the ultimate GT fan to compete in the European GT4 Cup in a real race-spec Nissan 370Z. In America, the winner of the time trial will get a trip to the Indianapolis 500. Sure, these are tantalizing grand prizes -- but we're more excited to see that GT5 is becoming a real game. Now, how about a release date?