Victory Lap: How Sim Racing's Forgotten Champion Returned 20 Years Later

It’s nice to get all the comments. I think I’ve always had stories I could tell and was super appreciative that Justin reached out. I think when you look back it’s pretty amazing how far sim racing has come and what kind of opportunities it’s been able to bring people. From friends to jobs to racing aspirations, it is definitely a special place when you take a step back and just look at what it has tuned into. I know when I was running a wheel that had a bungee cord for tension to running a DD wheel now and experiencing the huge difference in emersion that we couldn’t even fathom back then is wild. I’ve met so many great people over the years and I can honestly say without this part of my life I wouldn’t have experienced some awesome moments. Thank you again Justin and I’m looking forward to the next piece you make.

Very cool to see Justin making a mini-documentary on Kevin, who's still regularly active on iRacing and lapping me in FTF Cup races

I remember racing Kevin in NR4-NR2003. It's almost remarkable that some of us have been racing at our computers, online, for nearly 30 years.

Knowing that Denny has not changed in 20 years is somehow the least surprising part of all of this

I somehow beat Kevin in A Fixed or A Open at Charlotte in 2015 or 2016, I forget. He must've had an off day. Couldn't believe it, but it's one of the coolest things I've done. He's a superstar.

Sim racing documentaries are 🔥

Makes me feel old. I ran a few races with Kevin King on NR2003. He was feared back then and rightly so!

Dude you continue to blow my mind with the production value of these videos. I dont drive oval much but I 100% credit you for getting me into iRacing. Keep it up I’m loving the content!

It's crazy seeing names like Herman Reiss and Jeff Czupta, and knowing those guys still race on NR2003 to this day. They might not have been major contenders for wins back then, but 20 years later they're two of the best and most highly respected guys around the community.

A little bit of a follow up- Kevin is participating in races with the SIM500 esports league, where he has been pretty successful!! We are 8 races in, he has 5 poles, 5 top fives, 6 top 10s, and 2 wins, and leading the points. Us old guys do still know how to race ;)

Great guy. I met him on World Wide Technology a couple months ago and I asked him some questions about his brake bias. He was very nice and gave me much more information/tips than I could’ve ever asked for.

denny hasnt changed sounds about right great video mate, from australia

Couldn’t keep my eyes off of the cat eating the doorframe lol

It's good to see these guys get recognized. I was one of the really good open server racing guys, and I had a respectable race win ratio, but when I hopped onto open servers and saw King, Hamlin, Davies, Crandall, and some of these other guys, I knew I was going to finish second at best. I raced Hamlin a lot. He was as addicted to NR03 as much as I was, and he'd be racing on various open servers most nights. I don't think that I ever passed him legit 1 on 1. I'd just hang around in 2nd or 3rd and hope someone'd crash him. Often was one of the few people finishing on the same lap as he was is the best I could hope for. That's why he's racing for big bucks and I'm not. I wish that I had the balls to go into the elite serious leagues, but I felt like I was too undisciplined to hang. I spent my time making various graphics and sound mods, like the AOD_Mach42 Soundpack. Best time of my life in gaming. iRacing is great, but I miss the battles between racing leagues/guilds/clans, like you'd imagine old school kung-fu schools going to other schools and challenging them, but races instead of fists. Leagues would pile into another league's open servers and issue a challenge...

Wait, what? Kevin King is a "legend"? I had no idea. To me he was just one of the guys in the NR2003 community back in the day that I knew mostly as a fellow painter. I knew he'd gone to iRacing, but had no idea to what extent. I'm just now coming over from NR2003 now after 20+ years, too.

Man, some familiar names in those old points standings! I was never up there with them those names were well known back in the Papyrus and Project Wildfire days! Great stuff Justin!

Really cool of you to do this. NR2003 was such an experience in the day. IT was not hard or uncommon to bump into hamlin, truex and JR in the plate lobbies, Those no play daytona night servers lol! Ill never forget being 12 and having my mom come do the pace lap so I didn't miss a race jr was in. People said it was bullshit until iracing really came to the for front, and now its common place for even f1 champions. The pace at which sims evolved between 94-04 is absolutely incredible, there is NO WHERE near the jump the last 10 years, even 20 years, since then. So many things in modern sims started from these papyrus games its incredible. Im stoked to have played them as a young child, its a large part of why I love racing so much. Side note: Dont think its really fair to say that nr2003 is the magnum opus. The game was essentially a 2nd DLC to Nascar racing 4, 2002 being the first. There was a scraped truck and busch pack for this game. Project wildfire had info on it WAY WAY WAY back when. Anyone else remember BHmotorsports? As the combustion engine dies, we might look back on dale jr differently as a pioneer into the new way of racing.

Kevin I had no idea you made those paint schemes, that's so cool! Great video too. Probably my favorite one you've uploaded.

This is the type of content we want to see!!!! Well done

I have never played iRacing, nor have I really even followed it, but I literally watch all your videos. Keep it up, bro 👍