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[Guest lovretta]

I am no longer directly involved with BRD so I am free to bring what my experience developing, testing and driving the system you see in the video. I will go through 2 expriences.

To be honest, I still remember my days spent int he UK fiddling with the code to interface the motors and thinking into my head: "this is never ever going to work, it's just not like feeling the Gs on your body".

Once the system was sort of operational, we needed somebody to test it. Without the full car on the top and with the motors at full war power that thing was VIOLENT and vicious.. and that's the origin of the internal name "velociraptor". It was so scary that nobody wanted to step on it, so it came down to me...cause i was responsable of the code to move it

Well, i was on for 3 laps, on the third lap I was under my PB and I was totaly amazed it all felt so natural, direct and communicative.

But, of course, I am not a race driver.. so we come to the second part of this story, fast forward to april 2010 when we were invited at the official launch of the PRT center and for the first race I was sent against a couple of GP2 drivers, among them, Chilton and some others i cant remember SORRY!!!

Anyway.. i did have a couple of laps with the car we were going to use and the race was held in Aviano.. I honestly went in quite cocky thinking: "they have no chance, I will win this one easily". It wasn't the case .. during the 10 mins qualify the real drivers were amazingly fast in learning the track and they all finished slightly faster than me at the end of the qualify. "I'll have them during the race" I thought.. again, it wasn't the case, and I wasn't able to pass anybody and they all finished before me.

Speaking of real drivers, i forgot to add that i had one of the Croatian drivers that drives private Seat Leon in WTCC (he was champion before in Seat Leon Cup), and that PB he set at Monza with Leon - i never got to beat it, even tough i tried hard - and yet he saw the machine for the first time, and setted the PB on the second lap! - yes, outlap - hotlap - inlap. (all the RL drivers i saw on the machine tend to do inlaps probably they used to not having a ESC button )

[Guest NightShift]

That was very interesting, thanks for sharing

[Guest WWR Aero]

I first tried the simulator at Pure Tech Racing at their BBC Sports Relief event earlier in the year. Luckily for me I live quite nearby, and actually work within walking distance (this is very dangerous for the safety of my bank balance!!!).

The feedback you get from the simulator is excellent. You're securely strapped in, so you are literally part of the "car", and feel every little twitch underneath you.

Surprisingly, you don't feel like the cockpit is moving nearly as much as it actually is when you stand and watch someone else racing in it. It's more a feeling of pressure and G forces (it will pull up to 1.5G in a fast corner or under hard braking). You do however get shaken about something chronic when you get the car out of shape!

I'll be signing up for their "PTR5" championship (essentially Formula Ford) starting at the end of the month and can't wait (although I just know that Macau is going to become "car pinball" with competitors bouncing from wall to wall).

If you're interested in finding out more, go to www.puretechracing.com

[Guest CAR]

I first tried the simulator at Pure Tech Racing at their BBC Sports Relief event earlier in the year. Luckily for me I live quite nearby, and actually work within walking distance (this is very dangerous for the safety of my bank balance!!!).

I was away when that event was taking place, but have been thinking of paying them a visit, although living further away it'll be an expensive trip. The PTR3 at Macau seems a good combo (if it's available). Is the PTR3 the GP2 car?

I'll be signing up for their "PTR5" championship (essentially Formula Ford) starting at the end of the month and can't wait (although I just know that Macau is going to become "car pinball" with competitors bouncing from wall to wall).

There's a netKar PRO Formula Ford league running right now. With hard mode force feedback enabled the FF1800's such a blast to drive, as long as you remember nKPro has accident damage

[Guest CAR]

Just saw Mike Conway @ PTR on Sky News. Strange as they don't normally mention motor racing news outside of F1 & MotoGP.

[Guest CAR]

A video from BBC local news (not mine) showing Mike Conway driving the GP2 car at Aviano.

There's also another one from ITV local news that shows him at Catalunya, and the PTR Facebook group suggests it's coming although there's no official announcement. Sorry people outside the UK can't view this one, I tried to download it but only the advert before was captured.