I’ve been a racing fan all my life. From a very young age in the UK I would be woken up at 3am by my parents to watch just two things: American Football and Formula One races from East Asia. I had to get to bed early so I could wake up early and unfortunately I was the only person I knew with an interest in those sports.

As I got older I continued to find that the only person crazy about auto racing, was me. When the internet came along it allowed me to find other people with similar interests at last and finally allowed me to find other people who raced simulations.

Until the Inaugural A1GP event at Brands Hatch in 2005 I had only ever seen any racetrack in either a racing game or on TV, I was so shocked to see just how different that fantastic British track was, compared to those games and the 2D image TV had given me.

I’ve been lucky enough during my time with iRacing to be sent to a number of racing facilities (as scanning team backup coverage in a scheduling emergency) and every single one of them I have been shocked by. Those little intricate details that are finally captured and used by the production team after they’ve been captured by the scanner, they’re all things that (having a photographer’s vision) I’ve analysed, trying to figure out how it’s going to affect the cars as they drive it.

This year I’ve been on two scan trips, both of them ovals. Each one amazed me for different reasons and gave me a whole new respect for what those who race on them actually do…

The first track had pretty high banking and as I was standing, gripping hard on the safer barrier for support, I actually realised that if I slipped, I was going to really hurt myself. The greasy sheen that the surface had (because it had newly dried from rain) meant that my sneakers gave me no grip whatsoever. I actually ended up coming down the banking each time with one foot tucked beneath my butt as I just scraped and controlled the inevitable slide down to the apron using my hands. The scale, just the sheer scale, left me in total awe.

So, as someone who isn’t actually afraid of heights, I had a pretty good appreciation after that. I realised that some of these ovals are the modern equivalent of the Roman Colloseum because – even if their life depended on it – some people just could not save themselves from competition or the location itself.

I’m sat in a hotel right now as I post this, I fly home tomorrow. I’ve been at another track this week which frankly looks lifeless and simple on TV, yet I’ve seen now a lot of the little elements that must make this track one of the most challenging facilities around. I think with the level of detail and the magic wand of those guys in the production department, this place could actually become my favorite track within the service.

As crazy as some events might look on TV, they are most certainly a sanitised version of what you see when standing beside the track as a fan, and they cannot possibly compare to the experience within the cockpit. I think that the level of track surface detail you have experienced after racing at Daytona in the Chevy Silverado with iRacing, finally gives fans like me and you a closer appreciation than we could get from standing in the infield. I know that each track I have helped the production dept. with, I have watched the next race there in a totally different way.