Days after Ferrari->ke252 launched its new Driver Academy; the Scuderia is at it again. This time, Ferrari is launching a driving simulator that is as high-tech as it is intimidating. Weighing in at over 200 tons – yes, 200 tons! – Ferrari’s new Ultimate Driving Simulator comes with ten computers, five ginormous 3D video screens, and a 3,500-watt Dolby sound system. As far as the driver is concerned, he sits in a specially-designed cockpit with over five displays in front of him that offers a viewing angle of over 180 degrees. Not exactly the type you’d find in a Timezone.

Built in collaboration with Moog, the simulator comes with an aluminum and composite casing where the F1 race car cockpit is fitted in, as well as a number of equipment that provides the simulator with crisp audio and crystal-clear images. If you’re wondering why this whole system weighs around 400,000 pounds, the whole simulator – together with all the gizmos and high-tech gadgetry – is planted on a specially-designed base that allows the simulator to run on electrical energy with the whole machine producing as much as 174 horsepower. That’s more powerful than a lot of standard cars out on the road today.

Continued after the jump.

According to Stefano Domenicali, Ferrari's team principal, the new simulator will give Ferrari the "confidence some of the challenges that make up modern-day Formula One, while putting Ferrari at the cutting edge in terms of this technology".

He also adds: "Furthermore, I am pleased such a complex project as this, which got underway around two years ago, has been completed on schedule thanks to the efforts of all those who worked on it."

We know how serious Ferrari is when it comes to winning Formula One, as well as other racing series’ it ends up joining. But while the launching of the Ferrari Driver Academy didn’t catch us by surprise, this colossal driving simulator certainly did.

200 tons? Really?