An epic conclusion to the Virtual 2 Reality (V2R) competition!
Today we had our champion Alex “PureAxle” Little out on track at Hampton Downs racing around in the Crème Insurance 2KCUP car as his prize for taking out the V2R competition earlier in the year.
He drove outstandingly throughout showing not only the talent behind the wheel we’ve come to know from the man that goes by PureAxle online, but also the power of using sim racing to pick up the skills needed when in a real car.
As a special extra for the day we had our sim rig setup at the track thanks to Racetech NZ and Ping Zero. It was awesome to challenge each other for the fastest lap on Gran Turismo and try and chase the blistering pace that Liam Lawson laid down when he had a couple of goes.
Virtual 2 Reality has been an exciting new competition in 2020 created to open the door to New Zealands best sim racers to take their skills from the virtual world to the real world of motorsport in a real race car on a real circuit.
Over the course of the year New Zealands sim drivers battled it out through a series of open entry online qualification stages on Gran Turismo. The top drivers through each qualification series went through to Virtual 2 Reality finals series where the best of the best fought to prove they have what it takes to become the champion and earn the chance to jump from Virtual 2 Reality.
Virtual 2 Reality was a huge success on and off the track. Through the qualifiers and finals the series was able to attract many drivers, thousands of live views on Twitch, and tens of thousands of fan engagements on social media. V2Rs biggest individual series, the R.S.01 Trophy, attracting a big audience of it’s own.
The winner Alex “PureAxle” Little earned themselves a track day at Hamptons Downs thanks to Creme Insurance plus all travel and accomodation paid for. We also had series winners take home other prizes along the way thanks to sponsors Logitech, Tatnell Photography, PingZero, and Racetech.
As part of the winners track day celebrations we had the Racetech sim rig in our pit garage at the track available for everyone to have a go.
Liam Lawson came and showed us how quick he is (on track and in our sim). In between test sessions in a 2kcup car for the first time (which included a had a big spin at T1), after hearing our announcement over the track loud speaker, Liam came to check it all out, sharing in the banter around the sim rig and jumping in to set the fastest time of the day. Kaleb Ngatoa another future star to try his hand on the V2R sim rig and likewise showing his pace.
As a bonus Alex ended up being given the chance to switch cars and try out the Red Dragon where he continued to prove how good he can be not only in the sim but also out on track in full metal race cars.
After Fridays track day the Monkey Motorsport Club headed into Big Boys Toys to take on the Racetech sim rigs with PingZero. A stealer couple of days.
Since the V2R finals event Alex has continued to compete in traditional motorsport with Super Truck Racing. You can follow his latest racing adventures on Facebook.
