NASCAR driver Ross Chastain rocketed from tenth to fifth place within the last flip of a 500-lap race yesterday, securing himself a spot within the end-of-season Cup race and in NASCAR historical past, too. And he did it with a transfer he discovered in a videogame.
“Performed loads of NASCAR 2005 on the GameCube.”@RossChastain defined his video-game transfer. #NASCAR pic.twitter.com/4jkF6BzAgkOctober 30, 2022
Chastain made use of the basic ‘wall-riding’ manoeuvre: accelerating into the racetrack barrier at full pace and letting it steer him previous 5 opponents. The foolhardy transfer not solely secured Chastain’s group—Trackhouse Racing—its first ever look within the NASCAR Championship last, however it additionally set the file for the quickest lap within the historical past of the Martinsville Speedway (opens in new tab), the place the race occurred.
Rising up, Chastain “performed loads of NASCAR 2005 on the GameCube” he stated in a post-race interview, “and I by no means knew if it could truly work. I imply I did that after I was 8 years previous”. That did not dissuade him, although: “I simply made the selection. I grabbed fifth gear down the again and full-committed” earlier than he “principally let go of the wheel” and let the gods of inventory automobile racing resolve his destiny.
It clearly labored out, as Chastain’s place among the many 4 racers within the Championship this coming Sunday will attest, however not everyone seems to be thrilled in regards to the racer’s game-inspired antics. Final yr’s champion Kyle Larson told reporters (opens in new tab) that the transfer was “not a great search for our sport, in any respect […] I believe it is fairly embarrassing”. In fact, Larson himself tried an identical however unsuccessful transfer (opens in new tab) in a race final yr, so possibly he is simply jealous of Chastain’s approach.
It is a dramatic instance of videogames crossing over into the actual world, however it’s removed from the one overlap between the NASCAR world and ours. Various NASCAR drivers maintain their abilities sharp with iRacing (opens in new tab), the rules-heavy racing sim that we fairly like ourselves (opens in new tab). Personally, I am hoping Chastain unleashes one other game-inspired trick at Sunday’s last. Perhaps he can cheat the system by simply reversing over the end line proper in the beginning.
