Max Verstappen joins sim racing team, Team Redline

[Jack Hunsley]

Toro Rosso prodigy Max Verstappen has made a major step into the world of sim racing after signing with the world famous sim racing team, Team Redline.

The young Dutchman, who recorded his best finish in Formula One last weekend in Hungary with a 4th place finish, has joined the team "to practise and remain at the top of his game", and as such it is as of yet unclear whether he will actually race competitively for Redline.

On the move, Verstappen was quoted as saying that he has "been working with Atze (Atze Kerkhof, Team Redline's Manager) for a while already and of course with Team Redline and Fanatec I'll be sharing the virtual track with the fastest simracers in the world." Meanwhile Kerkhof added that he and the team were "happy and honoured to have Max onboard at Team Redline" and that he was "looking forward to continue our sim battles like we did in the F3 last year."

Team Redline has long been considered one of the finest sim racing outfits on the planet. Having competed in a variety of racing games dating back to Grand Prix Legends in 2000, Team Redline has since gone on dominate in almost every field and game they've competed in and have signed several high profile drivers such as Richie Stanaway, Nicky Catsburg and Kelvin Van Der Linde, whilst long time driver Gregor Huttu was recently in the news after becoming to first driver to take 50 wins in the iRacing World Championship.

However with the signing of a current Formula One driver, and one tipped for future greatness in the sport, this could very well be a hugely important moment for the future of simracing as a whole.

 

[Bram Hengeveld]

What a great honor for Max Verstappen that he is now allowed to race with the legendary Greger Huttu.

 

[Kurupt CDN]

Lol @Bram
Iracing tried jumping on the publicity bus to boost there sales, they posted this announcement on the 29th labeled Max has joined team Redline on iracing!
When you opened the article it started off with a quote from Max saying I always loved simracing and it's a great training tool, 99% of my simracing is done in iracing.
The article has since been edited in the last 2 days and that statement has been removed lol

 

[Yapci]

If they want to boost sales they should do an offline version with content at a competitive price and then put online and some stuff as payperplay and DLC (in case of new cars and tracks).

P.S: And dont sell it for 149148103413835013401517035273501357105710357135 trillions dollars!

 

[theiceman7]

I can't believe this guy is just a year older than me and does almost all of the same things that I do... ASIDE FROM DRIVING AN F1 CAR.

 

[Mitja Bonca]

But I doubt he can cope with Huttu and guys like him.

 

[paracletus]

congratulations on securing the next stage of your career max.
f1 the stepping stone to the serious stuff - assetto corsa.

 

[whaletail]

If they want to boost sales they should do an offline version with content at a competitive price and then put online and some stuff as payperplay and DLC (in case of new cars and tracks).

P.S: And dont sell it for 149148103413835013401517035273501357105710357135 trillions dollars!

Although iRacing is certainly interested in expending its user base, I'm not sure how fragmenting the service is in their best interests at all.

They've been profitable for a few years now, offering the sim racing community the best plug n' play multiplayer experience available.

Finally, while I'm always happy paying lower prices, the idea that iRacing is an over-priced service is pretty laughable. In the 5 months I've been actively subscribing, I've had the best sim racing experience of my life, and paid something like $30 for the pleasure.

I do, however, wish we could demo new cars, and series, for two weeks or so, to decide whether to drop the cash for an entire season's worth of tracks (in addition to the car), but at 60-80K members and growing, iRacing must be doing something right, and I, for one, have never enjoyed sim racing more.

 

[Tsfc]

What the. I had no idea there were "teams" to sim racing. Pretty interesting.

Is this a widespread thing?

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

Is this a widespread thing?

Yup.

 

[Tsfc]

May I ask what the benefits/advantage of being on a team are? Haha learn something new every day !

 

[Yapci]

You can switch drivers

May I ask what the benefits/advantage of being on a team are? Haha learn something new every day !

orch

 

[Tsfc]

Didn't realize it was endurance racing with teams, feel a bit silly now asking that question

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

Didn't realize it was endurance racing with teams, feel a bit silly now asking that question

That's one aspect.
But also, many of the teams get together some days each week, practice, making setups, sharing tricks etc.

 

[Tsfc]

That's really very interestING. Thanks for the insight Ole marius

 

[Martin Bulgin]

Just seen Max driving what looked like rFactor 1or 2 at home for practice on BBC

 

[paracletus]

max is on bbc tv f1 show - doing some sim racing at home.
using a Logitech g27 wheel and couldn't tell what game it was

^edit: ninja'd!
yeah, it did look like rfactor.

 

[vee10]

I noticed Max would rather use rfactor 1 than any of the Codemasters games.

 

[DomD]

I think that was filmed over a month ago, he has new kit now! Fanatec gear and triple screens, gotta say his pace is pretty close to us considering and hes improving all the time. In the Van Amersfoort sim (they use rFactor) he was on alien times nearly immediately.

 

[millen]

Anyone know Max's schedule.
Obviously I, along with many people I suspect, would love to spectate on a race of his.