How I Found Sim Racing At Age 60 | HackerNoon

I Woke Up This Morning and Realized that I’m Old

I’m sixty years old. My knees ache, my back has a knot that will not go away, and the doctor keeps using the word “moderation” like it’s a curse word. But just about every night, I’m sideways at 110 mph through a snow-covered forest in Finland, tires screaming, gravel peppering the underbody, my co-driver screaming pacenotes in my ear, my heart pounding so hard that I use my Apple Watch to monitor my pulse. None of it is real… and at the same time, all of it is real.

Years ago, when my kids needed me, my calendar was dominated by work, school dropoffs, prepping dinner, and fixing whatever broke that week. Jumping into a rally car, even a simulated one, wasn’t in the plans; I was too busy being the dad everyone counted on. The dream didn’t vanish; it just went dormant. Money was for mortgages, college funds, and AAU membership fees. But the itch never went away.

That Itch I Buried Back in the 1980s? It’s Back, and It’s Pissed.

During COVID, I watched a YouTube video of a man in Germany, throwing a virtual Group B Quattro through the Welsh forests. His motion rig moved, the bass shakers made a lot of noise, and the man was grinning like I did when I took my brother’s Alfa Romeo Spyder Veloce on a joyride in the summer of 1984 at my sister’s wedding. I felt something shift. Not nostalgia or my brother’s indignation, but recognition. Six months and a somewhat reluctant understanding, but beautiful wife later, there’s a full-size aluminum extrusion platform in my mancave, a 32-inch curved monitor up front, with enough computing power to run a small crytpo mining company, a 25 Nm direct-drive wheel that tries to rip my arms off, load-cell pedals that test my arthiritic knees, a Buttkicker thumping under the seat turning every curb into a kidney punch, and; this is the part that still makes me excited; a four-actuator motion platform that pitches me forward under braking and rolls me into corners and launches me towards the celing at each bump. The first time the whole system came alive on a loose-surface stage in the new Assetto Corsa Rally, I almost threw up from the full-motion sim experience. I was finally, truly driving flat-out, and nobody could take it away from me: not age, money, or even common sense.

My Brain Is Fooled into Thinking It’s Real

It’s a simulator, but the racing is real. I’m learning trail braking on loose gravel, fighting turbo lag in a Lancia Delta Integrale, and sensing that split-second when the rear end steps out as the weight shifts off the inside tire. When the motion platform yanks me sideways and that 25 Nm direct-drive wheel fights back with raw, unrelenting torque, my body doesn’t care that it’s not a real rally stage. My adrenal glands fire as they did back when I was in my RX7, heart pounding, palms sweating, that electric surge telling me the trees whipping by or the sheer drop-off into the reservoir could kill me. To my adrenal glands, it’s life or death, indistinguishable from the real thing. And that’s the raw, unfiltered thrill I have been chasing since my tires first slid sideways through the loose gravel at that first S-curve at my local reservoir 40 years ago.

And the best part? I can do it at 10 p.m. on a Wednesday, in my underwear, with a couple of Bud Lights and nobody telling me I’m too old for this. All of these levels of immersion: motion, vibration, haptics, force feedback, and visual clues, all trick my brain into thinking that this is a real-life experience.

==My hands sweat so much that I need to wear driving gloves to control the excess moisture and my grip on the wheel.==

My Midlife Crisis didn’t Buy A Porsche, it bought a Simulator

To anyone reading this who thinks life has passed them by: I’m you. Many years ago, I was working 60-hour weeks, changing diapers, driving kids to soccer/basketball/football practices, and telling myself someday. Now, someday is here, and it’s better than I imagined. You don’t need a lot of money. You can start with a second-hand Fanatec CSL DD and a Playseat Challenge from Facebook Marketplace and still feel more than most people ever will in a real car. Or you can go nuts and drop the price of a used Miata on a full-motion rig. Either way, the rush is the same. The technology has finally caught up with the dream. Direct-drive wheels have the fidelity of real steering racks, combined with motion systems, and Virtual Reality headsets; all of this has become small and affordable enough for a small mancave.

A Whole Community of Old Slow Guys

As it turns out, I am not alone. The sim racing community is full of old guys like me. Fifty-something up to Eighty-something former wannabe racers who found a second youth in a simulator. We trade setups, argue about which bass shaker placement gives the best “seat-of-the-pants” feel, how to attack a corner, and stay up way too late trying to shave a few seconds off a stage in the new ACC Rally Time Trials.

When that clock hits zero, and the co-driver yells “50, left 4 over crest, don’t cut!” and the whole rig lurches forward… I’m there. I’m in. I’m 20 again, doing stupid things while listening to Van Halen’s ‘Running with the Devil” on the 8-track in my 1979 RX7 around the backroads at midnight of the local reservoir. The finish line isn’t behind you. It’s five meters in front of your monitor, waiting for you to floor it.

Bad Shoulder, Burning Forearms, and Excessive Sweating

I did a lot of autocrossing when I was younger. I remember complaining how my muscles ached the next day from the constant fighting the forces of the wheel and the external G-forces from sudden movements on my body. With sim racing, I feel the same as I did then: I’m still sweating ten minutes after the rally stage ends, and the next day, my muscles ache as they did after an autocross.

The 25 Nm direct-drive wheel delivers the brutal authenticity I felt at 20, stupid and fearless, flinging my RX7 around the reservoir’s twisty edges, torquing my forearms raw through every corner like a rally car fighting back, while the load-cell brakes demand every ounce of leg power, turning my sim rig into the rally car of my youth… all from the safety of my mancave.

If you still think it’s “just a game,” watch this run (full cockpit view, motion, and haptics). Watch my face and my arms respond to every bump and corner through the Assetto Corsa Rally Wales Rally Time Trial. Listen to the co-driver give instructions while the rig tries to throw me out of the seat. Then tell me a 60-year-old can’t live like he’s 20-something again.

Here’s the proof. Turn it up, full-screen it. I’m new to Rallying, but I’m currently in 643rd position in the leaderboards and a mere 32 seconds out of first place!