Filed under: Motorsports, Etc., Toys/Games, Racing
Most people would love a chance to show their stuff behind the wheel of racecar. Problem is, most people probably wouldn’t be any good at actually driving one. We can all try to hone our skills through the use of racing simulators, but just how much can they actually teach you without the visceral feedback and life-or-death consequences that you can only get from real life? Apparently, they can teach us plenty. One person in particular, who goes by the name Greger Huttu, got to put his virtual racing prowess to the test.
Greger Huttu hails from Vaasa, Finland, where he can be found spending putting a lot of time into the iRacing simulator. Huttu is not just good at the game, he utterly dominates it. For the last six years, he’s turned 2,581 laps and led for 2,339 of them. He’s won every race from the pole position, including the iRacing World Championship that netted him a cool $10,000. Still… he’s never actually driven a real racecar, and the folks at Top Gear were curious to see if he actually could.
Top Gear flew Huttu out to Road Atlanta – one of America’s toughest tracks – and stuck him in a Star Mazda racer. Both the track and the car are familiar to Huttu because he’s experienced both in the iRacing simulator. How did he do? Quite frankly, he did amazingly well. Entering corners at 100 miles per hour, which is just 10 mph shy of where experience drivers come in, Huttu was able to rip off clean lap after clean lap and eventually came within three seconds of what the experts consider a solid time at Road Atlanta.
The difference between a professional driver and a professional simulator driver soon became apparent, however, as Greger Huttu’s body began to be affected by the G forces. The pros work hard to stay fit for a reason, and the toll on Huttu resulted in a helmet full of vomit. Though he wanted to continue, Huttu had to eventually throw in the towel because his body could take no more.
Still, his accomplishments are pretty remarkable and suggest that a good simulator can indeed prepare the armchair racer for a car and a circuit. Head over to Top Gear to get the full scoop on Huttu and his real-life racing adventure.
[Source: Top Gear]
iRacing star gets chance to try real thing at Road Atlanta originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 02 Dec 2010 18:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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