Sim Racing Moments

Installing and firing up Geoff Crammond's GP4 for the first time.

Brought years of early PC racing pleasure did that game, considering what he had to work with (those early PC's had way less oomph than a smartphone of today). His wet weather effects were well before their time. Awesome game.
 
The one that always sticks in my mind is a open server race in GTR2. It was at Monza. Everyone on the server was running Ferrari 550's, Saleen S7-R, and Vipers. So just for kicks I used a N-GT Porsche 911 GT3. It was raining during qualifying, but it stopped with several minutes left. I noticed that there was a dry line forming, and with just a couple minutes left I ducked into the pits and put on slicks. I ended up putting the N-GT Porsche 2nd on the grid. There was the usual pile up in the first chicane, which I avoided, and went on to win the race by just running consistent laps. Every once in a while a 550 Ferrari would go flying by me, and after a few corners I would see it off in the sand. I remember thinking how cool it was that you could notice a dry line, switch to slicks, and put in a flyer with just seconds left in qualifying, all in a sim.
 
Mine would be past and present.

Sim Racing Past
Graduating from Console racers like PGR, Forza and Gran Tursimo to a PC with Race 07 and GTR2. The step up in realism and feel were also the catalysts for investing heavily in new sim racing hardware.
Not just hardware as in wheel and pedals but hardware in the shape of a new PC that is constantly upgraded to keep up with demands.

Sim racing present
This morning at about 6am I was locked in an epic battle on a very well behaved public server, think it was a Kunos official one, on Zolder and the entire field were separated by only a few seconds.
It was clean and fierce and reminded me why I love this past time so much. That sort of battle in real life would cost you hundreds of thousands to get to, but I can wake up at the crack of dawn and get that action for only a few thousand.
Plus I got a 3rd place podium after 10th in Quali which made it pretty sweet.
But the race before that I made an unforced error, ended up in 16th and the fight was literally just as tough. So much fun.
 
My happiest sim racing moment was January of 2012, watching the UPS man struggling to carry that CSR Elite and load cell pedals up my snowy driveway.

Took me six months to save up the money, I was 35 years old then but felt like I was 10.

Sim racing makes me smile, sim racing hardware keeps me young at heart.
 
Playing hotseat Grand Prix 3 and Grand Prix 4 hotseat with my fantastic uncle. We played with keyboard, no assists except auto gears. We picked 2 cars each and controlled our teams.

The most crazy moment was when we were playing Grand Prix 4, and his BAR Honda got out of the pits with invisible tyres. It was a vital point at the championship and his qualifying was ruined, he was genuinely angry. :D That game had hilarous bugs. We used to call the track marshal "Hercules" as he was able to push the cars alone.

We also played GP 4 at a crappy PC, so the frame rate was not optimal. Then he got a better one and we were truly amazed by the sheer sense of speed going through the start/finish straight at Interlagos.
 
First time I hit the boost button in VR in the Porsche 919 coming out of Tetre Rouge in the first iracing 24 hours of Le Mans in 2017. I had woken up at 4.30am Australian time to begin my stint about 6 hours into the race and my team was in 2nd place in a very low split. My excitement had been building for weeks, nerves were toast, but I managed to drive fast and clean. A couple of days later I was on a plane heading to my first actual LM24 where I met up with one of my team mates. Not sure which one of those is theory and which one is practice but the harmony was perfect!
 
Back in early September 2018, a Sim Racing System F4 race at Portimao in R3E. Managed to score pole position in qualifying, my only pole position for an online race so far. It was one of those "no idea how the hell I actually did that"-laps, where everything just came together perfectly. Unfortunately I made a mistake into T1 two or three laps in, fell back to P3 - but from then on it was a three way fight for the lead, and I ended up finishing P2. Despite not winning, that was the most fun I've ever had in a race so far.

Another one of my favourite moments happened a few months earlier, also Sim Racing System in R3E, but this time WTCC at Brands Hatch Indy. Managed to overtake someone into Paddock Hill Bend, and it just felt incredibly satisfying.
 
My sim racing past is quite present since I started almost 2 years ago :D, but I've had great moments. Can't forget the first pole and the first win (still one since I don't race on iR atm :roflmao:) on iRacing, both at Laguna Seca with the MX5, great races at Okayama Short with the MX5 battling for the win. My first oval podium on the Street Stocks with exciting battles. Also some good races in public lobbies on AC, Lotus Exos S1 at Spa, lot of fun battling for the first places with some wins, which were unexpected clean races for a public lobby on AC, La Source can be a nightmare in public lobbies. Also some great league races on F1 2017 and 2018. Not much, but still good memories for a slow guy
 
Firing up "Revs" on the BBC Micro Model B for the first time back in '84 - the beginning of a lifelong love of sim / game racing. In my mind's eye I remember it as being superbly detailed and reaslistic and I lapped and lapped and lapped for the pure joy of it. I DON'T want to see any youtube clips proving how crap it was :)

The beginning of Geoff's legend!
 
Beating Norbert Michelisz twice... :D
(Okay, it was a Race07 based mini fun-cup with three tracks, three cars, two races for each in a single evening. And there was some chaos involved as well. But he's still our own, Hungarian touring car hero, it was of great honor to battle with him.) :whistling:
 
Grand Prix 2 , 2 point lead in the championship into last race at Adelaide over Hakkinen, Last lap at the hairpin at the end of Brabham straight , Hakkinen gets held up from a back marker and I and slip past to win the race and the championship.

Grand Pix 4 at Malaysia , dry race then with 9 laps to go it rains, into pits for wets then off again, have a lead over Schumacher the full length of the start finish straight, last lap he is right up my clacker and just hold on to win.

My first online race win with RF2 driving the Callaway , Mid Ohio ,full GT3 field, wet start , about 20 mins to go with a big lead, most of the field took a chance to run slicks, rain stops, pit for slicks then in the lead and being chased by aliens , hold on with the last few laps of major stress and finish first with second place right on my tail.

and some people think racing computer car games is boring, :sneaky:
 
getting two poles and two wins at a `Gentlemans Race Club` season event using Rfactor1 , just had the setup nailed.
never a feat to be repeated after several seasons with that once great club.
are they still going ??
 

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