To celebrate the launch of the Nürburgring 24h pack on Assetto Corsa Competizione, publishers 505 Games teamed up with LFM for a 24 hours event. In that race, one competitor did the unthinkable.
With the start of the NLS, endurance racing season at the Nürburgring-Nordschleife has well and truly kicked off. Slowly but surely, also due to the 24H Qualifier events held on April 13 and 14, the excitement for the legendary Nürburgring 24 Hours is starting to build.
24-hour racing is a unique challenge, as you are not only battling the other competitors but also fatigue, the environment and countless other factors. Typically, one will do these races in a relay with other drivers in a team. But that is not to say there have not been a few crazy attempts at doing it solo.
Le Mans in 1950, Eddie Hall finished 8th without handing over to his teammate once. Two years later, Pierre Levegh very nearly won before he suffered an engine failure in the last hour with a four lap lead. Nowadays, solo 24-hour driving is explicitly forbidden in real endurance racing. But not in sim racing.
Luke Whitehead is a Veloce Esports ACC pro driver, having won five straight championships in the Apex Online Racing league, two LFM Pro Series titles and an SRO GT World Challenge America title. He decided to do the impossible, tackle the 24 Hours of Nürburgring launch event solo.
Ferrari and Williams fielded their top ACC division teams, and even streamer Marco 'Mabix' Bischoff competed with the Sprout team. The strength of field was incredibly high, and Luke knew this, so he fully expected that the best he could hope for was a top ten finish at a major stetch.
A more realistic expectation Whitehead had was getting to 16 hours of the race and just calling it and immediately resting. In fact, just four hours into the race, he began feeling drowsy.
"I had done four hours non-stop driving before in an SRO event, it was the most I had ever done. After doing that, I looked at the timer and realised there was still 20 hours left and I was like 'Oh..'.
That was when it really dawned on me that I was having to drive non-stop with very minimum mistakes because I did want a decent result. Also considering the toilet breaks, I had my first about six hours in and I knew that I had to do it relatively frequently.
Every two to three hours it would get tougher but it was once the sun rose on the second day with about eight or so hours to go, it became a lot easier. Then with two hours to go, my brain started playing tricks on me and I was almost passing out down the straights."
During the height of Whitehead's hallucinations, he recalls hearing the likes of James May and Jason Statham taunting him for missing apexes. His mother even came in and put a wet towel on his face to keep him awake in the latter part of the race. Of course, the race was not without its incidents with him being as fatigued as he was.
Luke had a few excursions and got some heavy damage at around ten hours in. The front headlights were flickering whenever he braked heavily which coupled with how exhausted he was, it was immensely off-putting and blinding, so he was forced to pit early to deal with it. But then not long after he left the pits, he had another major crash. Thankfully, that was the worst of it.
Whitehead concedes that sim racing for 24 straight hours is nowhere near as impressive as doing it in real life. But during the days where solo 24 hour racing happened, the drivers were having to take it easy and ensure car parts do not wear out. Whilst in sim racing, drivers are pushing every lap, so this added a different kind of challenge to Luke's effort.
"In ACC, you don't get damage from taking the kerbs, it hurts you in the rig since you are holding a steering wheel but if you need to hit a kerb to gain time, you will. With all these teams being as strong as they are and obviously having their swaps, they are going to be performing on all cylinders pretty much the whole race.
After 20 hours, I am not going to be performing at that level so it makes trickier to be fighting with these guys. Makes it even more surprising to me that I was even in the fight for the podium."
The spoils may have gone the way of Into The Breach who took victory and also second went the way of the Unicorns of Love team, but it was Whitehead who quite literally made the headlines for his outstanding attempt. When asked why he did it, Luke was very nonchalant with his answer.
"I mean, why not? Doing a 24 hour race solo was something I had always wanted to do, and the prospect of doing it on the Nordschleife, it is the biggest challenge. I'll stream it, will be good content, honestly I didn't think many people would care. Thought it would be a fun little gimmick, but I never expected it to become what it was.
It became so much more. It was a pleasant surprise, and a fitting tribute to my aunt's dog Feena, who passed away a couple of days before the event."
Would you attempt to do a 24 hour race solo? Let us know on Twitter @OverTake_gg or in the comments down below.
With the start of the NLS, endurance racing season at the Nürburgring-Nordschleife has well and truly kicked off. Slowly but surely, also due to the 24H Qualifier events held on April 13 and 14, the excitement for the legendary Nürburgring 24 Hours is starting to build.
24-hour racing is a unique challenge, as you are not only battling the other competitors but also fatigue, the environment and countless other factors. Typically, one will do these races in a relay with other drivers in a team. But that is not to say there have not been a few crazy attempts at doing it solo.
Le Mans in 1950, Eddie Hall finished 8th without handing over to his teammate once. Two years later, Pierre Levegh very nearly won before he suffered an engine failure in the last hour with a four lap lead. Nowadays, solo 24-hour driving is explicitly forbidden in real endurance racing. But not in sim racing.
Luke Whitehead is a Veloce Esports ACC pro driver, having won five straight championships in the Apex Online Racing league, two LFM Pro Series titles and an SRO GT World Challenge America title. He decided to do the impossible, tackle the 24 Hours of Nürburgring launch event solo.
24 hours Solo Against Pros
Just to put it into perspective, the drivers taking part in the event were also high-calibre ACC pros. Other Veloce drivers in the event included the likes of reigning SRO GT World Challenge Europe champion George Boothby, Gran Turismo World Series Nations Cup runner-up Angel Inostroza and content creator Jardier.Ferrari and Williams fielded their top ACC division teams, and even streamer Marco 'Mabix' Bischoff competed with the Sprout team. The strength of field was incredibly high, and Luke knew this, so he fully expected that the best he could hope for was a top ten finish at a major stetch.
A more realistic expectation Whitehead had was getting to 16 hours of the race and just calling it and immediately resting. In fact, just four hours into the race, he began feeling drowsy.
"I had done four hours non-stop driving before in an SRO event, it was the most I had ever done. After doing that, I looked at the timer and realised there was still 20 hours left and I was like 'Oh..'.
That was when it really dawned on me that I was having to drive non-stop with very minimum mistakes because I did want a decent result. Also considering the toilet breaks, I had my first about six hours in and I knew that I had to do it relatively frequently.
Every two to three hours it would get tougher but it was once the sun rose on the second day with about eight or so hours to go, it became a lot easier. Then with two hours to go, my brain started playing tricks on me and I was almost passing out down the straights."
During the height of Whitehead's hallucinations, he recalls hearing the likes of James May and Jason Statham taunting him for missing apexes. His mother even came in and put a wet towel on his face to keep him awake in the latter part of the race. Of course, the race was not without its incidents with him being as fatigued as he was.
Luke had a few excursions and got some heavy damage at around ten hours in. The front headlights were flickering whenever he braked heavily which coupled with how exhausted he was, it was immensely off-putting and blinding, so he was forced to pit early to deal with it. But then not long after he left the pits, he had another major crash. Thankfully, that was the worst of it.
Whitehead concedes that sim racing for 24 straight hours is nowhere near as impressive as doing it in real life. But during the days where solo 24 hour racing happened, the drivers were having to take it easy and ensure car parts do not wear out. Whilst in sim racing, drivers are pushing every lap, so this added a different kind of challenge to Luke's effort.
"In ACC, you don't get damage from taking the kerbs, it hurts you in the rig since you are holding a steering wheel but if you need to hit a kerb to gain time, you will. With all these teams being as strong as they are and obviously having their swaps, they are going to be performing on all cylinders pretty much the whole race.
After 20 hours, I am not going to be performing at that level so it makes trickier to be fighting with these guys. Makes it even more surprising to me that I was even in the fight for the podium."
Finishing P3
In spite of everything, Whitehead somehow ended up finishing third. Many average joe sim racers may have done a 24-hour event solo but, typically it does not involve a field of drivers who are at such a high level, and they may end up multiple laps down from the lead.The spoils may have gone the way of Into The Breach who took victory and also second went the way of the Unicorns of Love team, but it was Whitehead who quite literally made the headlines for his outstanding attempt. When asked why he did it, Luke was very nonchalant with his answer.
"I mean, why not? Doing a 24 hour race solo was something I had always wanted to do, and the prospect of doing it on the Nordschleife, it is the biggest challenge. I'll stream it, will be good content, honestly I didn't think many people would care. Thought it would be a fun little gimmick, but I never expected it to become what it was.
It became so much more. It was a pleasant surprise, and a fitting tribute to my aunt's dog Feena, who passed away a couple of days before the event."
Would you attempt to do a 24 hour race solo? Let us know on Twitter @OverTake_gg or in the comments down below.
