Motorsport or Sim Racing: Which Came First for You?

Motorsport for me, unless you count riding around on a pushbike when your a kid, making motorbike noise's thinking i was on the manx tt. I'm now 63 yrs old and have started making those sounds again!!!

My father took me to the "1000 km-Rennen Nürburgring" in 1970 and we did a lap on the Nordschleife in an Opel Commodore A GS with the whole family. At the same time, there was a rather famous hill climb race near our hometown, the "Sauerland-Bergpreis", which was twice a final round of the DRM ("Deutsche Rennsport-Meisterschaft"), in 1972 and 73. We could see Jochen Mass, Hans Heyer, Strietzel Stuck, Rolf Stommelen, Keke Rosberg and many others in the paddock in a car park in our local forest.

I started sim racing only two years ago, at the age of 60, but I focus on hillclimbing in AC and hotlapping in ACC and AMS2.

Turbito said:

My father took me to the "1000 km-Rennen Nürburgring" in 1970 and we did a lap on the Nordschleife in an Opel Commodore A GS with the whole family. At the same time, there was a rather famous hill climb race near our hometown, the "Sauerland-Bergpreis", which was twice a final round of the DRM ("Deutsche Rennsport-Meisterschaft"), in 1972 and 73. We could see Jochen Mass, Hans Heyer, Striezel Stuck, Rolf Stommelen, Keke Rosberg and many others in the paddock in a car park in our local forest.

I started sim racing only two years ago, at the age of 60, but I focus on hillclimbing in AC and hotlapping in ACC and AMS2.

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Thats pretty awesome, you got to witness a lot of the golden era of touring cars and gt racing, I'm a bit jealous ngl.

No brainer in my generation as there were no virtual race games around when I first followed car racing on TV in the early 70s. For me the ladder was definitely: Matchbox - slot cars - Tamiya scale models - TV - hiatus of about 15 years (university, job, family) and then Motorsport and Sim Racing kind of started simultaneously again late 90s with the first PC and my son wanting to have a slot car set and watching F1 and DTM with him on the weekend.
edit: and I always loved car racing board games or card games, still have a smallish collection of those from 40 years ago.

Motorsport, by a long shot. I recall watching F1 races on ABC Wide World of Sports in the mid-sixties. In high school my best friend and I spent many Saturday evenings at the Montgomery Motor Speedway for the regional NASCAR events (Sportsman and Late Model Modified), twice a year there were NASCAR Grand National races there.

Competed in my first sanctioned event in summer '70, an SSCA Jr race at the old Industrial Park track in Montgomery (I think that was the last race there). Worked my way up in SCCA through the seventies, got my TransAm license in '78; a provisional waiver to test IMSA around '80; an unofficial test in an Indycar in '81 (did much better than I expected, performance was merely miserable rather than utterly wretched ...never comfortable in open wheel cars, not even a 50hp Formula Vee). Very much a "seat of the pants" driver I didn't adapt well to the new generation, instead of driver briefings being about track conditions and strategy, it was "approach T4 in 3rd gear at 4800rpm", and I was thinking you don't need a driver, throw a radio and a box of servos in the car and let the computer drive it. After some test work in "C-Era" cars i discovered vintage racing, and never looked back. Twenty years of that, getting seat time in anything I could and enjoying every minute. Quit at age 54 when it was obvious I was no longer pushing myself or the car as I should.

Discounting the old arcade "Pole Position" I started sim racing with the classic "Indianapolis 500: the Simulation" and the odd "Grand Prix Unlimited", with a track builder and AI that drove like the player didn't exist. Then ICR1 & 2, Nascar Racing 1, 2, and 3, N2k3, GPL, F1GP 2 & 3, SCGT, Rally Trophy, GTL, GTR, GTR2, rfactor, RBR .....

"Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time". John Lennon

Catiorro F1 said:

Thats pretty awesome, you got to witness a lot of the golden era of touring cars and gt racing, I'm a bit jealous ngl.

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Yes, I'm aware of that, I simply was lucky. Love to Brazil.

Probably sim racing.

Although I was into cars from an early age, my interest in real-life motorsport came after I fell in love with Geoff Crammond's Grand Prix on the Amiga and later the TOCA BTCC games. After that I became more interested in the real series and my interest in motor racing gathered from there.

Watching Indy 500 on a tiny fuzzy black and white.
The 1966 crash was indelibly imprinted on my mind.

Was not till decades later I discovered computers
Just for Indy500 on PC

Upgraded from XT to 286.
EGA graphics and colour monitor.
Sound Blaster 1.0 8 bit.
Headphones.
Joystick then Madcatz wheel.


No doubt that this saved my life from decades of drug addiction.

Motorsports.
Some years before SimRacing.

Motorsports for me startet on a quite spartanious level, solely with an eye (ear) on the pinnacle series: F1.

And this may sound as silly as Four Yorkshiremen from Monty Python, but apt for my childhood in a country at that time largely devoid of motorsport traditions, me being alone with my interest in my environment, except an uncle to share with, for just once in a while.

As a 6-7yo kid in late 70ies, my country's TV broadcasting of motorsports was close to zero, looking extremely forward to each weekend, laying on my familys genuine carpet in the living room, awaiting with great excitement. And what was I waiting for? Answer:

The 5 min 12PM lunch radio news on saturdays and sundays.
(Edit: must've been overseas races or my memory plays me, probably Sundays were late afternoon news).

With maybe a few sentences of Saturday's F1 qual results and Sunday's F1 race results, just before the weather forecasts. Just top 3 names mentioned. If I was lucky I got a strike of 3 consecutive F1 weekend top 3 results, not knowing anything about the F1 calendar.

But enough for me to get familiar with names like Gilles Villeneuve, Jacques Lafitte, Patrick Depailler, Didier Peroni, Jody Scheckter and not at least Ronnie Peterson and later Nelson Piquet, of which became my idol during the 80ies (edit: why did I forget to mention my biggest heroes?? Keke Rosberg and Niki Lauda). Just learning to write I tried to memorize the names and write them down, and was excited how often I got it right, when I was lucky grapping the sports section of my dad's newspaper.

No joke, that's how it was.

So interest in motorsports came in a special way to me, all between the ears, daydreaming spectacles and the responsiveness factor, my ears - down to hand, pen and paper, names and drawing cars, then trying again to imagine and daydreaming how Villeneuve overtook Peroni or similar thoughts.

A year later with first motorsports magazines, and got an eye on other series, especially prototypes, mainly due to aerodynamic designs made of a boy's dreams.

Then we moved closer to local speedway ground, just in the years of the golden age of speedway in my country, me as a boy knowing the holes in the fences and the good spots. Never missed a chance of a league race as attentant, and often attended training sessions becoming star struck when my local heroes had just a small friendly chat to me.

And then words cannot describe my enthusiasm on my first TV Broadcast experience, some years later:

The 1982 Monaco Grand Prix.

For me entering with grief in dark shadows of the sad news on my biggest idol next to Superswede and Piquet; the passing of Gilles Villeneuve. But a heck of a race to the finish line.
From there on I was severely hooked.

Then came 1985 and my C64 and sim title 'Speed King' and hell broke loose

Motorsport first. I remember my dad watching F1 way back in the day when we had cable. The sound and the way they moved fascinated me. As I grew up I really wanted to race but couldn't afford it. Things like Gran Turismo filled that void and eventually sim racing on PC.

The real thing has always been a fascination of mine and it has surpassed the costs of sim racing by quite a massive margin.

It's a shame both of these hobbies are so pricey because there is nothing that compares to it, whether it's throwing a car or motorcycle around on a track. I have found very little in life to be as enticing.

Motorsport, I was a massive fan! Got into sim racing bcs I could learn more about the cars & driving.

Does not matter where you begin , the important thing it's to begin somewhere, the wrong thing is to invest so much money into sim racing and not do the real thing, that's a tremendous unbalance , it's similar to invest tons of money into karting and never make the move into cars and that's another unforgiven sin.

It was close... Formula 1 first on TV and quickly after, Pole Position at the arcade with friends

For me it was motorsport, and it was long before sim racing even existed. In 1973, when I was in 2nd grade, I bought a book from a bookmobile that used to come to my school. The book was called "Indy 500 winners." It had pen and ink drawings of every Indy 500 winner from Ray Harroun in 1911 to Gordon Johncock in 1973. I was fascinated with it, and it started my love for motorsport. I still have the book to this day. It started me watching Indycar, F1, and NASCAR. By the 80's I was in love with Formula 1, and Group C/IMSA sportscar racing. In the mid 80's I dropped out of college and went to a racing school. It wasn't until the mid 90's that I discovered racing sims. In fact I bought the first computer I ever owned because I wanted to run Grand Prix Legends.

it started in the 1980's: F1, group C sports cars and group B rallying.

Motorsport first, something with age I think. Simracing had not yet been invented (or at least not available to the average person) in 1975. I read in a magazine about Niki Lauda in a Ferrari at Circuit Zandvoort. Since then I watch Formula 1 and have hardly missed a GP live on TV. Occasionally I visit an F1 circuit in real life.
I wasn't into computer games at all, until my son asked for a racing game. That became Codemasters DTM racedriver 3 (Toca racedriver 3), not on one PC but two PCs so we could race against each other. In no time my son and I were addicted to sim racing. Because Toca racedriver not only contains touring cars but also other racing classes, we became more interested in motorsports other than F1 alone. Now we follow other motorsports besides F1. My son has now had a modest karting career in real life and we still occasionally go karting for fun. But most of our time is now spent watching F1 and sim racing.

It started when I was 12-ish with Konami's F1 Spirit on the MSX (not the 3D version, mind you), if you can call that a simulator. Then a couple of months later on a holiday, I did a downhill bike ride where I got my first adrenaline rush from speed, which allowed me to put speeds of 300+ into some perspective. And only then did I start watching the real F1 (Hockenheim 1989) and was instantly hooked.

Funny thing is that only months before that, I caught a glympse of an F1 race in Monaco and I thought it looked ridiculous, those frail skimpy cars. I was more into the General Lee and KITT type cars up to that point.

But I've never stopped playing/simming, and never stopped watching after that summer.
The Greatest Driver on MSX-2, Accolade's Grand Prix Circuit in cyan, magenta and white on the PC, followed by Grand Prix Cycles in 16 amazing colors, and then on to the Grand Prix series by Geoff Crammond, Need for Speed 3, 4 and 5, Gran Turismo 4, 5 and 6, and finally Project Cars 1, 2 and AMS2 in VR. Simming has come a long way!

Great stories here, and so much variety on how we all ended up with this passion. Thank you all for sharing, and keep 'em coming

i started watching f1 (Prost/Senna era around 1984/1985) as a kid
i always enjoyed cars games as a teenager/young adult, then started proper sim racing way later, like 4 years ago (i didnt knew it was a thing before that).

Motorsport had to come first for me. I was 12 or 13 before even the basic forerunners of sim racing came into existence and 17 when Revs was released - the first title that IMO could rightfully claim to be a sim.