Inside iRacing’s 2026 Big Season One Update

A polished rally sim lands, a free dirt rocket arrives, and iRacing doubles down on realism—so why are we still talking about sound? We kick off with AC Rally, a brutal but beautiful love letter to Richard Burns Rally that actually works out of the box. Then we dive into iRacing’s Season One plans: Adelaide and Miami join the track roster, Rockingham gets a full rescan without erasing history, and Bathurst is set for a striking visual refresh. It’s a solid content mix that rewards both oval and road racers.

The big headline is the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup 992.2. Faster, sharper, and now shipping with ABS and traction control, it mirrors the real series and stokes debate. Purists will miss the old razor’s edge, but the new tire spec, improved braking options, and consistent rulesets should elevate racing quality across sprint and endurance. Meanwhile, the IR-18 IndyCar gains a modern hybrid system with in-car energy management and deeper telemetry, NASCAR Trucks benefit from refined CFD and dynamic drafting, and GT3 cars get practical garage improvements and manufacturer-aligned power curves. There’s also a clever on-ramp to dirt: the FIA Crosscar, free to all members, paired with accessible RX tracks to welcome newcomers without dumbing down the physics.

We also tackle the two elephants in the rig: UI and audio. Search lands in the new UI, netcode adds a network quality safeguard, and the team shares progress on a brand-new renderer. The tension lives in the soundscape. iRacing outlines a multi-threaded audio overhaul with global and cockpit reverb and impulse responses tailored to tracks and cars. The vision is right; the wait feels long. We make the case that immersion demands sound parity with physics and graphics, and we invite you to weigh in on what matters most: audio, visuals, or vehicle dynamics.

If you’re eyeing Black Friday, we share real-world buying tips, from avoiding weak “sales” to spotting legit bundle value. Then we want to hear from you: Does the 992.2’s tech make Cup racing better, or does it soften the skill ceiling? Has AC Rally scratched your rally itch? Tap follow, share this with a sim racing friend, and drop a review with your grade for iRacing’s update—what did they nail, and what should come next?

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 1:00 Announcements
• 19:55 Main Discussion
• 1:17:30 Closing Remarks

Transcript

Jason: 0:00

This episode is brought to you by Trophy AI, the ultimate performance coach tool for simracers. I'm your host, Jason Berber, and I'm joined here by the Almighty, the true, the tried and true. Jeff Smart. I'm trying to figure out a good way to, I don't know.

Jeff: 0:49

Well, I appreciate the I appreciate the intros no matter what it ends up coming.

Jason: 0:53

I'm gonna find a new one every single week. And possibly midweek, because we just got a comment that they want a midweek show. I don't know, man. Listen, we can uh we can sit down and talk about it, you know, see what the options are. But yeah, it's good to get on here every week with talk to Jeff. Um he lives so close, but yet sometimes we just don't have time. You know, he's busy, he's got family, he's in the middle of a move transition too. So I hope everything is going well. What was your week, man? How's it going?

Jeff: 1:26

It's good, man. It's uh again, like this. I hate saying it, but like again, this I think I said last week, you know, some days, some weeks you're the nail, some weeks you're the hammer. I got the nail again this week. Um, and it just might be that way for a little bit until uh kind of the dust settles with the move. I think we have like a handful of episodes left where you're gonna see you know the background as you know it, or have seen it for I don't know how almost a year now before it changes. So uh we'll get there. Times are things are happening. Um looking forward to you know some of the changes that are coming up, but uh it's keep me busy. It's keep me busy. So it's been a heck of a week. It's great to get down here and talk about uh you know simracing stuff. So I'm ready to get into it, buddy. How was your week?

Jason: 2:05

My week has been great, man. I you know, I had a few weeks where I was kind of like feeling a bit of the burn. So I took a break, been playing Arc Raiders, I've been playing all kinds of stuff. And you know, I've had some content that's that was planned to be released already, but sometimes you need a break, right? Sometimes you need to step away from all of it. This applies to any creator that I can think of out there. Um many that are close to me express the same things, you know, um, and they're like, Yeah, sometimes you just need a break. And I think I've been slowly coming back, and I think this is the first week where I'm 100% like excited, and and um things are happening, things are moving. I'm planning my vacation. That's another big boost of morale, you know. Where are you going, Jason? You already know I'm going. I'm basically Japanese, stuck in a Puerto Rican body, you know.

Jeff: 3:06

But been there a few times. You've been there a few times.

Jason: 3:09

I always, you know, it's just it's kind of like you know, you're moving. So I sometimes I question how long am I gonna stay out here, you know, and and and stuck in paradise, trapped in paradise on a rock. And we're so close to Asia, we're so close to it that if you was to travel from anywhere else in the lower 48, it's a pain in the ass.

Jeff: 3:32

It's a long way, it's a long way.

Jason: 3:34

Imagine going to Singapore. Remember when you went to Singapore from here? Imagine doing that from from the east coast. That's like a day and a half of travel right there. That's insane.

Jeff: 3:43

Yeah, that's why we, you know, my wife and I made that big trip, it was just like it's we're like two-thirds of the way already out there, you know. So we just knocked it out. It was a bucket list trip, it was super cool. But yeah, I'm I'm excited for your trip to Japan, buddy.

Jason: 3:55

But I mean, you you have me here, and you're still keeping your home here, which I think is the smartest thing. It um I hope I can share that.

Jeff: 4:04

But yeah, that's why if anybody wants to rent the house in Hawaii, hit me up.

Jason: 4:08

Um but even if you didn't, you have a place here and you can always reset the time clocks here, spend a few days, hit the beach, and then go to I don't know, I was thinking about Australia too, as an option like Melbourne or probably butchering the name, right? It's not Melbourne, it's something else. But um New Zealand's out there, you have this side of the world, you know. So let's just say making travel plans uh or just having not to think about um just the daily routine is always good. It's always a great thing, and we're motivated. So yeah, but the show will continue. Everything will just magically every Monday you'll have your episode. There's gonna be no fighting, there's gonna be no biting. Magic of show uh showtime, just the uh swish and flick, whatever. Um, but yeah, man, that was my week. Uh, we're gearing up for Daytona. By the time you watch this again, it's it's never on my side.

Jeff: 5:09

I know.

Jason: 5:10

Whatever happened to me, happened to me, and I might be in a different state next Monday. So, but this Monday I'm happy we're gearing up for the race. Um, timesheets are filled out, meaning all the slots are getting in there. And hopefully, Jeff, when he finally starts to get into GT3, maybe get him in there forcefully someday because if F1 is kind of lacking, and but uh yeah. Anyways, I'm happy that you're having a good week and um I'm excited to be here today. And we have a few things, so we'll go over the announcements here real quick. Um, what you got here, Jeff?

Jeff: 5:46

You got the uh yeah, let's chat a little bit of uh some uh some new titles been out there. So we got uh AC Rally um that's kind of came out, and I'm I'm a little I I think I've talked about this. I'm a little bitter that they released AC Rally opposed to AC Formula, right? I mean, yeah. You can't tell me. You can't tell me that there's more rally fans than than open real fans out there. You're not gonna convince me of it. They should have spent the capital and the time.

Jason: 6:11

I don't know what the story is. I really don't. I haven't dug in that long, that that far to know if because what they're saying is it's a different team at Kunos. That it's a different team. I know, but the formula team. Well, um, I'm here to say that it is worth every penny. I have tried it out, it's like $20, $25 or something on Steam right now, and it doesn't feel like a like a pre-release game. All the graphics work, triple screen out the box, um, controls work.

Jeff: 6:44

What a novel idea, Jason. A game goes to public and it works, and it works. We haven't, we as a sim industry, our sim racing industry have not delivered one of these in a minute.

Jason: 6:55

Now, the thing that might not work is your driving techniques because yeah, this game is just this sim. It is a worthy title of a sim to call it sim. This sim is very like very close to the physics in Richard Burns rally. So if you guys play Richard Burns Rally, this is the game, the sim for you. Uh, you're gonna love it and hate it at the same time.

Jeff: 7:22

That was what I heard. Yeah, I don't mean to cut you off, but that was the exact analogy. What I heard, what out of the comments that I read was really I haven't watched a single video, Jeff.

Jason: 7:29

So I'm glad that I'm on the road.

Jeff: 7:30

I'm glad you're here. Yeah.

Jason: 7:33

That's what's up. So so you've heard good things then. You've been you've been looking around and doing some research.

Jeff: 7:38

Yeah, I mean, I just watched, you know, some uh you know YouTube videos and just you know people posting on the socials. And uh I the first thing that blew me away was I was fairly impressed with you know some of the good the graphics that were uh I was pretty blown away with the graphics. Uh I thought it was pretty impressive, and then people were saying it's hard. It is not a video game. It is to your point, it's worthy of the sim title. So yeah. Uh I I think it's just as good that it's a polished product out the gate, not this kind of BS that we've been getting for the past couple years with early release. Yeah, I mean it is early release, right? You know, where it's like half baked. Right. You know, so this is uh kind of a breath of fresh air, I guess is the right way.

Jason: 8:22

Yeah, yeah, 100%. It is a pre-release, meaning there's only two tracks, there's only a handful of cards. They have like uh maybe 10 cards, I think, something like that. So it's not a full game, right? That you could play, but it's very, very, very solid. Meaning if you spend the money now, you'll get the full game at this at the at a lower price, and that's the kind of the the trade-off, right? So um it's beautiful, it's beautiful, it runs great. I mean, I don't know what else to say about it. It's great. I mean, I thought about streaming it, but yeah, I you know, I need some uh it's a practice for those who streamed this thing. I'm pretty sure that was take number 99 or take number 80. I'm pretty sure the same thing, yeah. Like you just because none of them were live streams, so only very hand, very slow amount of people were live streaming it. No, they were they were videos of them driving. So that was like, oh, okay, so yeah, we got a video, yeah. All right. So what lap is this?

Jeff: 9:27

Take number 328.

Jason: 9:29

I mean, no hate, you know, for all that for all for all that had the you know, the balls, you know, no other word to say the balls to put the camera on and and shoot it. It is great. It's great. It's it's a breath of fresh air because we don't have rally games right now. Ea WRC got cancelled, so there's no content for it uh being made. The only options right now are RBR, which is very a very niche, right, group of racers. It's a huge world, but passionate dudes, yeah.

Jeff: 10:03

Right.

Jason: 10:04

Just think of it this way if if if I was to key phrase uh you know put it into one phrase, it is RBR with modern graphics. That's it. And that right there is the perf. That's like the perfect child. Yeah, yeah. Perfection, bro. That's like, yes, DNA, it's awesome. So AC Rally, highly recommend, highly recommend, I could say, uh, to all of you that are thinking about it, and it's Steam, guys. Put the credit card in there, swipe it, make sure you time it right, make sure you have time to test it. And if you feel like you don't like it, then refund it. You can refund. You can refund games in two hours or less.

Jeff: 10:47

Great point.

Jason: 10:48

Uh yeah, make sure you don't have two hours. If you if you mean if you leave it on pause and you go to the store or something, it's over. It's yours. It's over. Just think of a clever way of an excuse uh to tell Steam, which I can't say here, but I'm pretty sure you can come up with a nice excuse to tell them why the game might not be working on your PC, for example. So um, and request an update, uh, a refund. So uh small tips and tricks. So the next one we have here is NASCAR, which we have no update for you.

Jeff: 11:23

You know, it's surprising because I haven't seen a lot of people talking about it, you know, uh uh on a lot of the socials that we when it first came out, there was a couple, and then there was kind of trailed off, you know.

Jason: 11:38

Well, I think I think AC Evo kind of took its kind of took its stride away. Yeah, I don't know. Um yeah, I mean that there is a NASCAR fan, but this is what I think about NASCAR. We already have a huge NASCAR game that's called iRacing. It's massive, bro. Tell me what NASCAR, what more NASCAR do you need? So for those of you that are on a console, console, yeah. I can definitely get the urge to try NASCAR, but it's a it's more of a sim cade, I'm hearing. This is what I'm hearing. I haven't tried it yet. I'm waiting to see if it goes on sale on a Black Friday, which I highly doubt because I it just came out. So um, yeah, maybe maybe I'll just buy it and test it out and practice my own knowledge, right? With uh with the Steam game thing, but I don't need Steam to come after me, you know.

Jeff: 12:38

So we've had an uptick in refunds after your podcast was released. No, where what is going on? Yeah, so you know it's not causation.

Jason: 12:50

Yeah, I mean, you know, you know, speaking of Steam, it's not here in the notes, I just thought about it, but Steam had a uh uh announcement of products coming out, they have a Steam box, which is like a PC now, um, that a lot of SimRacers caught the attention of the Simracers. Um, and here's what I'll say about it off the bat. So when you're gaming with Linux, because that's what it has, Steam OS is technically uh it's based off of Linux. It is a Linux operating system. There's cheat um anti-cheat engines that work with Windows only, and a lot of the games like Formula, like EA has their cheat, um, their anti-cheat only works on Windows. So yeah, unless you can figure out a way to install Windows, kind of defeats the point of this Steam box. And yeah, they announced the VR headset, and I think it was a controller, but uh we could we could put that out on a on a future episode. We'll we'll dig into the details. It was just kind of um announced and shown off, and that there's like a portal. If you if you guys are interested, by all means go to Steam and um it's like on their homepage, you can see it. But uh what else we got, Jeff? What else we got this week?

Jeff: 14:08

I think uh I got a Black Friday update for uh Fanatech released their schedule. I guess is probably the best way to say it. There is they're gonna push it out on 25 November. So that's probably just prior to a what you'd think is a traditional Black Friday.

Jason: 14:22

Um so what 25, right? So will this episode be out? Let me see. No, this it'll be the it'll be basically tomorrow. It'll be it'll be basically after you see this, then uh you know, sales start the day after the airing of this podcast if you if you watch on Monday. So um that's yeah, I hope you do watch on Monday and it'd be the start of your week, right?

Jeff: 14:47

So and uh Jason, I have a something I'd like to share with everybody. So um I'm gonna share my screen a window real quick, and uh I just want to let everybody know I am now fully prepared for Black Friday financially. I'll share this. Oh uh Jason, if you can see this.

Jason: 15:04

I can't believe it.

Jeff: 15:06

I can't believe it. Um I have uh sold a kidney. I am ready to do it.

Jason: 15:11

Wait, wait, is that the left or the right?

Jeff: 15:13

I mean, I I don't know. I think x-rays are taken from top down. So what's that? Your left kidney?

Jason: 15:18

Should be I'm oriented myself to see which one it is.

Jeff: 15:23

So uh yeah, it's just it's just an obvious one.

Jason: 15:26

This was the funniest sell a uh he sent me uh randomly, and I was like, where did you get this, bro? It's like sell a kidney. Somebody took an x-ray of them selling their kidney. Don't sell your kidneys, guys. You need them. Yeah, turns up. If one of them fails, you have a backup. If if if you only have one, man, you're playing with you're playing with life right now.

Jeff: 15:45

So just tongue in cheek. Yeah, I saw it. I was on one of the Facebook groups somebody posted about, and they were like, Yep, I'm fully prepared financially for Black Friday.

Jason: 15:54

That's hilarious. And guys, happy shopping. I mean, this year, it doesn't feel like it was last year, right? It feels kind of weak this year on the sales side. It's like there's sales happening at different times, at different dates, and it's kind of all over the place. Um, yeah, that's how come it's really hard for us to put on an episode and just have it just be the one uh episode, which I I still I mean, I'll take a look again, you know. But next time we jump in the studio, but I don't think there's gonna be like this massive update, like, oh wow, you know, I don't think so, man. I think we covered the major players, right? We covered the major players that that are usually the suspects, the usual suspects, and they don't, it's not much. So that could be many things, guys. That could be uh just the way things are going, right? With the economy and world changes and all this stuff and manufacturing costs.

Jeff: 16:55

It's hard for them to I I'm assuming it's hard for them to put out a sale, so depending who they are, where they come from, but I think some of it, if just last thing before we move on, is you know, I'm not yeah, we're such we're such a niche industry that I don't know how much uh profit they're making per product. It's probably not a lot, so they don't have probably a huge margin to put all this Black Friday sale out there, you know what I mean? Like only big people like major distributors like Micro Center or Best Buy or I still look every day for Micro Center, had they had like the killer setup, a killer best buy or best uh Black Friday deal last year. It was like a Evo rig from SimLab, my uh uh Sim Magic base and wheel, and it was some pedal, it was everything, and it was like 1200 bucks. You know, I was checked, I think last year there was uh the one of the best deals I found for Black Friday was on uh Micro Center. Um they had like a SimLab rig, um Sim Magic base, a wheel, pedals, everything you need to do to you know to get into it and uh into the into the the sport hobby. Uh you walk in, slide your card, get home, spend a couple hours, uh, you know, wrenching, put your put your rig together, and you're there. You know, if you have a PC, you were you're there. Um, and it was like a smoking deal. I think it was like 1100 bucks or something. Like it was you would save in general a couple hundred bucks. So like it was a legit Black Friday deal, not as like 5%, 3% stuff. Like it was a smoking deal. And I think Micro Center could do that, right? Because they probably buy like this stuff in bulk, um, where they get a better deal and they probably have better margins. But um, I keep looking every day. If I find it, you know, um, I'll probably share it in a comment uh for one of the for whatever the newest video is that we have. So um I'll keep looking, but uh yeah, it was smoking deal. So other than that, I think you ready to get into the the main discussion points here, Jason?

Jason: 18:56

Yes, sir. I think with Micro Center, I think it's um I think it's mainly the uh what you call this overstock parts. Oh, maybe so. And then they take them and build and and and see if they can build a full rig, and you know they'll they'll spice it up and throw high-end pieces in there, and maybe take this in here, and then I I I'm I don't know, maybe, maybe that's how they do it. Um because their deals are just out of nowhere. And when you look at the writing, it's like they don't tell you, but then I guess if you call them, they'll tell you what what specific parts are in there, and then that's kind of an indicator of how they do it. Um I mean, a deal's a deal, right? Good parts are good parts, so as long as they got good parts, we're good to go. Um, yeah, guys, and with that, Micro Center, keep an eye out, Best Buy, Door Busters, whatever they call them. So main discussion time.

Jeff: 19:56

Let's go.

Jason: 19:56

So it is that time, I guess. It's every three months that we have an iRacing Developers update. And this is quite a long one. So everybody strap in. I am going to try and move along as quickly and as efficiently as I can. So here we go. I'm gonna share my screen. I have it nice and ready. This is November 14th. This development um update came. And I'm going to read. It says, Yeah, hold on, let me put this over here. It says the 2025 competition year is nearing its conclusion, and in just a few short weeks, 2026, week one, you know, season one will begin. Um, before driving into the usual upcoming season preview, the main event, and then he goes into please allow me to a moment to reflect a truly special 2025. So this is more of an update. Let me just this is an update throughout the year, throughout their year that I don't think needs to be in this conversation. Season one, 20. Let's go with uh season one, 2026 tracks. So it looks like something in Australia and some graphical updates here. So I don't want to butcher this, but the uh uh Adelaide Street Circuit is on track for season one release. We're incredibly excited to bring the iconic Australian racing experience to our fans down under and to racers worldwide. Uh Adelaide's Deeps Deep Motorsport History dates back in the mid-1980s when it hosted Formula One. Interesting. And has continued to thrill. Yeah, it might be in a next track or something that we might do. Thrill fans to this day as a staple circuit for supercars. Uh here's some pictures of it. Uh Adelaide has a great deal of character and is respected and renowned amongst real world race car drivers. Flanked throughout the by concrete walls, the track features high-speed sections such as Brabham Strait, where formula cars can exceed 200 miles an hour. The high speed is not limited to straights. And the infamous turn eight is a fast sweeping right-hander where cars are commonly pushing 130 miles per hour while on the edge. Wow. These high speeds and sweeping turns contrast with the demanding Senna Shicane, where three switchback turns require great position to extract the optimal speed, combining bumpy surfaces and ever-changing grip. Adelaide is known as a physical and mental test for drivers, and accomplishments here are particularly uh revert um revered and respected. How special to have the ability to experience this at home in our rigs, free from punishing heat and g forces experience at this circuit. In the world of motorsports and sim racing, this track is a must experience for enthusiasts. Yeah, look at this. Interesting. So we are excited to announce Miami International Auto Drome, which this might be Miami, I'm assuming. I think so, yeah. I think so. No, this is um uh Australia, I think. You know what? No, this is Miami. Sorry. This is the Miami track, see the rope way, yep, whatever. So, yeah, they're announcing the Miami track debut in season one. Uh, we were fortunate to have had the opportunity to collaborate closely with the track management team on this project, capturing the data required to complete it, as well as supporting their ability to test the configurations and provide feedback during the project's development. iRacing Miami features five configurations, including a full Grand Prix circuit. The track is visually unique, wrapping around the hard rock stadium, home of the NFL Miami Dolphins, Gold Dolphins, to offer a distinctive combination of street circuit style sections and more open areas. It features a blend of extremely high speed straights and flowing turns, which more technical sections that require precision and skill. The circus completion, one of a kind location require uh creates an engaging visual experience in the sim, looks stunning, and is rewarding to master.

Jeff: 24:51

So these are some of the screenshots here of the that's kind of cool because everyone they had to go map it during the race week, right? Because it's a parking lot when it's not being used. Yeah, that's kind of cool.

Jason: 25:06

Yeah. So next up, we have uh a new dirt oval at Lucas Oil Speedway, was introduced to iRacing some time ago. Uh Vigilant iRacers, iRacers may have observed an additional circuit located immediately past turn two. So this sounds like an update, right?

Jeff: 25:26

This is the Lucas Oil Speedway. I think it's in Vegas. Don't quote me on it.

Jason: 25:32

Okay, somebody correct us, please. This is the facility dedicated off-road uh off dedicated off-road dirt road course. And we are also pleased to expand our dirt road catalog with this high-quality track in the real world Lucas Oil Speedway off-road host UTV and Pro Truck Competition. We have great overlap with the dirt road vehicles in iRacing, and further, the off-road tracks uh serves as an excellent proving ground for all new dirt road car we are adding in the season one build. Yeah, if I crosscar.

Jeff: 26:14

Um correction, Jason, Lucas Hall Speedway is Missouri, way off. Sorry, continue a few miles out.

Jason: 26:21

Same, same.

Jeff: 26:22

Same, same.

Jason: 26:24

Other side. Um, yeah, it's okay. Well, we're like like I said, I'm not too familiar with this one. Uh it says here, FIA crosscore, more cross-car, more info on the FIA cross car to follow. Okay, so they're gonna talk about that. Uh, Lucas Oil Speedway off-road will be a free download for all who already own the dirt oval. New customers, it's a great deal to get both tracks with one purchase. And this line right here, this line right here is i Racing telling you to buy this track right now and then get it for free later if you want the track, right? If you want the new track, buy the old track because it will get you that much closer to the 40 club. If you if you if you don't know what the 40 club is, then we we we we can't speak about it.

Jeff: 27:16

But for those who know, if you're in a 40 club, if you if you like saving money, research the 40 club in iRacing. It's not really saving money.

Jason: 27:24

That's not saving money, not really, but somewhat, you know, in the future you could save uh the it's like how my wife views saving money.

Jeff: 27:33

Well, I'm gonna spend $100 to save $13 later. 20. Yeah.

Jason: 27:38

And I get a coupon. Okay, so Rockingham Speedway update. A key component of our ongoing NASCAR refresh project is finally ready. This this is what did I just say about NASCAR? What did what did I just say? i race and keep dumping money into time and at NASCAR. No love for the formulas, though. Zero love for the formulas right now. So it says, despite a one-season delay, we have finalized the details and are now through to announce its release, marking the completion of the entire NASCAR refresh initiative. The updated Rockingham Speedway is the result of a full rescan and a ground up remodel using the new data. However, we know iRacers have great fondness for the unique characteristics of the original layout, so we'll keep that historical version available. Thank you. The rescan and the original track will be combined into a singular package with multiple configurations. Best of all, if you already own Rockingham, the rescan version will be added to your account automatically. Sweet. And I'm liking the textures here.

Jeff: 28:49

I was gonna say that. I don't know, vivid. Just the detail off track just looks nice.

Jason: 29:00

Yeah, man.

Jeff: 29:01

Yeah, I mean, look at that's hands-to-shoulders nicer. For sure. Yeah. Alright, let's get back to there's your monthly payments, right? That's the thing. You know what? That's looking yeah. That's that's there's at least you're getting a quality product for your month, your money every month.

Jason: 29:19

It's not the greatest thing in the world, you know, comparing it to the They're getting better. Bro, this is a 15-year-old game. Uh sim. So, I mean, come on. Oh, yeah, we're gonna we're gonna get into that. We're gonna get into that. I just saw what's what's up next because we're reading this for the first time, we're sharing it for the first time. Uh, refreshes now that NASCAR refresh uh project is complete, we are applying these those lessons on a border scale to our expansive library of global circuits. We are excited to announce that efforts to update Bathurst. Are well underway. Watch out. Watch out. This visual refresh has a strong chance of debuting in season in the season one build. So there's a chance. Please note that there's a visual refresh to bring that track up to the current quality standard. It is not a rescan. That said, we still sent our team back to Mount Panorama because poor them, they get to take a vacation at Mount Panorama.

Jeff: 30:26

Sign me.

Jason: 30:27

I feel so sorry for them.

Jeff: 30:28

Volunteer's tribute.

Jason: 30:30

To capture new reference and photo uh photogrammetry photogrammetry? Is that how to say that right? I don't know. Studies. That's good enough. Photography. Taking pictures. Making them 3D. Allowing us to take full advantage of current art tools and processes. The results are phenomenal. So we can see them here of them mapping out basically parts of the terrain. So that they we could, you know, they could see. I guess they could play with it, they can adjust it. You know what I mean?

Jeff: 31:06

Yeah. I mean, it's again, this is them trying to bring the you know the graphics up. You know, they're not just sitting idle and doing nothing. Doing nothing. Yes.

Jason: 31:17

We're thrilled to bring our current level of quality to this amazing circuit where the technology truly shines among its numerous embark embankments and natural features. Check out the screenshots. This is next level work that had our entire art team buzzing with excitement over what the principal artist of the project was producing. So, this is this is a great example of a development team like iRacing that is truly excited. They love what they do. I mean, look at this. They're excited off of a piece of terrain that they're obviously gonna make it look sharper. You know, it's just a lot of love. I I see the love, I feel the love, basically. Reading this, and here we go with new cars. I only see one here. Oh, I know, but this one is enough.

Jeff: 32:14

I do you guys.

Jason: 32:17

So we are thrilled to announce that the Porsche 911 Cup 992.2 will debut in iRacing with season one. The Porsche 911 Cup, we're not gonna go with the 992.2, 0.1, 0.2, represents yet another step improvement for the Porsche Cup series, both in sim and in reality and sim, excuse me. The real world car sees a small bump in power over previous generation, 10 horsepower, improved front axle response through revised aerodynamics and suspension geometry, improved driver display functionality, ABS and TCS standard as boom and other reliability and maintenance optimizations. Performance is expected to be around 1 to 1.5 seconds per lap faster than the 992.1 model for a typical Grand Prix style circuit. So I have very mixed feelings about this. It kind of I'm excited that they are adding the new car and the you know, the wheel that I'm testing and about to drop a review on. This is the car that coincides with the VPG Porsche wheel. There's a reason why it has an ABS and a TC toggle on it because they they started adding that in real life. Um, I know some Porsche Cups competitions, some of them are been having TC and ABS. There's different versions of them, and I'm not gonna pretend like I know all of them, but I will say this the legendary status of driving this car and it being so difficult to drive was the pride of it. You know, it kind of kills the you know, it's like adding TC on a formula car.

Jeff: 34:09

Hundred couldn't agree with you more. Like I view the people that drive this car it, you know, obviously in real life, but in iRacing competitively, as like people that are honing their craft to the next level. Yeah, you know, like it is all skill. There's no, I don't say technology might not be the right word to help you in AIDS. But this is not much you can do to her.

Jason: 34:33

All you can do is shift the weight, you can shift the balance from forward or back, that's it. So everything else is gas and break, and if you squeeze her too much, she will let you know and it's too late. So, anyway, end of an era, as one of the guys was saying, a lot of people are not too happy about this. But again, if iRacing, iRacing's goal is to match reality, and if this is the car that's going to you know be out and about in 26, and this is the new standard, then we must obey to that new standard, right? So, whether we like it or not. Same thing with Formula One changes that are happening in 26. A lot of changes coming down the pipeline, and a lot of people are scared. So um, maybe on a future episode we can go over those changes before they happen. Pretty sure Jeff would absolutely love to talk about that 100%. So I'll move on. Says here in the sim world, we are replicating all of the above and more. Our model will feature our latest spec of dry and wet tires in line with our prior GT3 and GT4 tire updates developed in conjunction with real-world drivers and engineers for the 9-11 cup. So that is an upside and there's a downside, and that's the upside. Is that right now the cup car is still being driven on the old tire model? It hasn't moved to the new GT3 tire model, which is amazing. Amazing, it's amazing. So it we I don't want to say too much, but um, it remains to be seen, right? When it comes out. So we'll see. We'll see. Along with this much anticipated tire update, the car model also features the following improvements over the 992 model, and I'll go over these briefly. Uh, proper rules package when running at Nureberg Nosh uh Norse Life configurations. Thank the Lord the heavens. This was a this was a B I T C H because you would load a setup and iRacing was like, fail. Okay, you failed me. But I load up an iRacing baseline setup and it would fail again. That's so frustrating when they do the yeah, and then it's like, bro, this is your own setup. How is it failing? Like it shouldn't fail. So they finally fixed this. Thank God. Um moving on. Ramp over range of front and rear brake pads options, including delivery and um and endurance specifications. Okay, awesome. So we got better braking under endurance. Uh ABS is enabled, which we already talked about that. Traction control is enabled, which we already talked about. That and these are the different series. While the real world cup series does not typically use traction control, the spirit and endurance configurations of the car do typically run with traction control enabled. And for ABS, I'll go here. This is in line with the direction taken by many cups series in 2026. While we understand this may, okay, yeah, I don't I don't care what you have to say about it. But this is this is them making a decision for safety, I want to say the biggest thing is safety here. Um but, anyways, the combination effects of both the real world and in sim improvements is a car that is more accurate, more engaging, more responsive, and more fun than the prior iteration of the 9-11 cup, which I agree and disagree. I agree and disagree until I until I put hands on it. In iRacing, the 992.2 will immediately replace our current Porsche Cup car across all levels of competition, bringing the official series up to the latest real world specification. Upon the release of the new Porsche Cup, the car will be granted to all iRacers who already have the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup. At this time, the 992.1 will be changed to legacy content and the 992.1, 992.2, two for one opportunity will cease. Okay.

Jeff: 38:59

Wow. The original didn't stay very long.

Jason: 39:03

No. No, the original got canned quick. Yeah. So that's the 992 update. This was the highlight of for for many people. Many people just scrolled down here and then off-clicked. So let's continue. I see uh what do you what do you call this thing? It's like a dirt off-road thing.

Jeff: 39:19

Yeah, some type of I don't know. Yeah, we'll see.

Jason: 39:23

Oh, that's that FIA cross car that they were. Oh, the crosscar.

Jeff: 39:26

Okay. I I didn't I had heard the term, but I didn't know that's what it looks like.

Jason: 39:30

It looks like a freaking like a dune buggy, but a single seater sort of. I don't know. See, dirt road racing and iRacing has been missing a key ingredient at the lower rungs of competition. Again, everybody but F1. It seems to be missing something. Some bullshit. As great as our off-road road trucks and RX cars are, they can be a handful to drive and build confidence with. We have long waited, long-wanted, excuse me, to support this iRacing discipline better and are pleased to partner with the FIA on a significant new entry point to dirt road racing, the FIA crosscar. Want to have a live coach available on demand? With Trophy AI, you'll be able to practice with Mansell AI at your convenience, a real-time coach in your headphones to navigate and guide you through the track, helping you achieve race pace. This tool is awesome as it provides full brake, throttle, and steering telemetry on screen with a live review getting you ready for your next big race. Check links to Trophy AI in the description and also use Chicane12 in all caps for a 12% discount. The crosscar is an incredibly quick and nimble dirt racing car, offering approachable driving alongside approachable driving alongside a high skill ceiling to push the vehicle to its limits. The driving characteristics are also incredibly fun, allowing racers to slide the car around. I can definitely see that the guy is sliding the shit out of this. Look at the tires pointing and look where he's going.

Jeff: 41:09

Yeah, he's like looking at his side window. Yeah. Not even a window, just like a hole in the roll case.

Jason: 41:17

Yeah, so you can slide around with great control and launch it into the air with high stability and smooth landings. This might be uh look at you know, man, look at this. The FIA crosscar will be available to all I racers at no cost. Wow. In season one, the crosscar will debut in the all-new FIA crosscar fixed series and race on an assortment of our free RX tracks. Whether you're a dirt fan or not, we encourage iracers to give this awesome car a drive. It's a blast. You don't want to miss out. So see the see that's give you a reason to get into some of the dirt racing, right? Yeah, you have a whole nother i rating for dirt. And this will be a perfect way to get into that, just to mess around to see what the and it has all the bells and whistles. This is a brand new car, has all the physics, you know, has all the graphics, you know, all that stuff.

Jeff: 42:14

I used to have, you know, when I was lived back in New England, they had a, you know, and these are the cars that are kind of run at your, you know, mom and pa, back, you know, uh not very popular tracks, you know, on Saturday nights in the summer. They used to have these things up at it's like Star Raceway up in New Hampshire, and like they race these type of things. And it was like, I remember going with my dad and my you know, some of my neighbors and stuff, and it was it was freaking awesome to go watch these guys just, you know, these are guys that have nine to fives and work on their cars, you know, uh at night, and they put them in a trailer and they run the hell out of them, you know. So it yeah, it should be cool to get in here and give it a go.

Jason: 42:48

Hell yeah. I mean, it's gonna be I I want to see what these tracks are. I'll probably look take a look at them after we get done here, but it it looks nimble enough to literally fly off the cliffs or or jumps. So it might be fun. I know the trophy racing is fun as hell. I love that.

Jeff: 43:06

I did a bunch of it, yeah. I haven't done it in a while, but that's fun too, yeah.

Jason: 43:10

In VR, this has got to be crazy, bro. Sliding around like that.

Jeff: 43:14

Actually, looking sideways and stuff, yeah. You definitely need some type of triples or ultrawider VR or something to really appreciate it 100%.

Jason: 43:23

So car system updates. Hey Jeff, look, we have an update here that the Laura IR18 IndyCar has received a pair of updates this season. Art update. The car has been refreshed with all new high-resolution artwork. Hybrid system update. The hybrid system overhaul that debuted in season four has been expanded to include the IR18. This update aligns the car with the current specifications of the Real World series. This to support this, iRacing has updated their car's physics to reflect the added acceleration, balance changes, and fuel strategy considerations that come with hybrid deployment. New driver controls and in-car displays have been added so members can monitor energy levels and manage power usage during competition. Telemetry has also been expanded to ensure teams and drivers can analyze hybrid performance in detail. So it'll work with all your dashboards.

Jeff: 44:38

Yeah, that's cool. Because in the in the indie car, it's I believe it's very similar to uh the F1 cars where they you know regenerate. It's not like the IR15, like we had did uh you know, kind of a special on a couple episodes ago where the push. You get a hundred a hundred seconds and it's gone, right? Now this car regenerates, and it's cool that you can kind of see that, but then like you can look at your you know um your statistics and see where the better use of the you know the the battery is and where you are generating it and stuff like that. So that's kind of cool that they're showing a little bit behind the behind the curtain on how that's happening.

Jason: 45:15

And again, this is them, they could have just released a new car and charged you for the new car. But then no, if you own this car, you get support. You're getting things that you're getting you're getting the love. You know what I'm saying?

Jeff: 45:30

If you and it's cool that they're part, I don't know if they're calling it an official partnership, but you see indie next and indie you know series on the officials. Like I know that it's not as simple, but it would be great to see F1. Yeah, I'll like part partnership on there with some of these. But like those two cars are awesome. The IR 15 and the IR18 are freaking awesome open-wheel formula cars, they're super fun to drive.

Jason: 45:58

I don't know. I'm pretty sure this isn't an I racing problem. I think this is uh Oh, it's an FIA, yeah, FIA money that they want stupid amounts of money to get the license. Because if they could, I'm pretty sure they would have, you know.

Jeff: 46:14

So I mean that I'll just is as good as it gets on i rating. I mean, everybody just puts their own F1 livery on their car and you're driving it anyway. So whatever. There you go. We'll play pretend. Yeah.

Jason: 46:27

So the GR86, Toyota, has received multiple significant updates, including center of gravity location adjusted to prevent bicycling and rollover. Increased ARB size to match real world series specs. Uh only yeah, only ARB, huh? Interesting. Realignment, rear, excuse me, rear alignment settings altered to match real world series specs, increased spirit spring rates, ranges to include in international series values, uh adjusted drive line uh parameters to better match acceleration performance, small changes to engine torque power curves to reduce mid-range power drops. Amazing for a free car that you get with the service. So we've taken a more uh rigorous look at the aerodynamic modeling for the NASCAR trucks. Last year we launched the CFD-based study aimed in refining our existing aero model. While those findings were implemented in SIM, it became clear that there was an opportunity for further advancements. With support for industry partners, we have developed the new CFD model using a body-shaped contour to capture the offset and skewed configurations commonly seen in competition, pushing the boundaries of the regulations for maximum performance. This refinement led to meaningful changes and significantly enhanced the handling fidelity of the trucks in iron racing, especially in high yaw, angle, and side-by-side scenarios. So on the draft uh font, we're updating our trucks to our latest, more dynamic drafting model previously implemented on our Gen 7, 6 and ARCA vehicles.

Jeff: 48:20

I think that's like a sneaky popular um like spec or a portion of iRacing. Like I feel like that truck racing, you know, the NASCAR truck series in iRacing is like fairly popular. It is, you know, like I just gotta feel like fun, dude.

Jason: 48:37

It's a lot of fun, dude. I I I love driving those and the big trophy ones too, off-road. Those are dope.

Jeff: 48:44

I told you the story about when I got into uh a truck race, you know, some it was perfect for NASCAR. I'm in there and somebody just you know, as we're gritting, somebody just goes, out in the corner, and then somebody else falls down in the streets. Like that couldn't have fallen into a better official race category for NASCAR.

Jason: 49:09

It was like he was like, This is this is exactly what I went.

Jeff: 49:12

There went like five different people with the whole verse. It was awesome. It was awesome.

Jason: 49:16

They were followed suit.

Jeff: 49:18

Oh yeah, bro.

Jason: 49:19

All right, man. Well, yeah, that there's definitely a different group category of people out there. There's there's something for everybody, right? In the sim. There's something for everybody. That's that's why we love it so much. It's because i racing is a platform, it's not Laman's ultimate that's just road racing. This is everything, everything. You know what I mean? It's kind of like your career. I I look at iRacing as my sim racing career, uh, except for formula, because we're limited on the formula stuff. Which again, uh let me get through this. All right, we'll we'll grieve on it later. Um, still have hope that a little down the screen, I don't want to scroll too far, but they're mentioning GT3 again. Although the GT3 class received a comprehensive overhaul, our work never ends. And season one, the GT3 class has undergone multiple additional improvements, include quality of life improvements to the garage. Now all cars have spring purchases that adjust automatically. Thank God, thank God, when the spring rate is changed. So, you know how you change in the height of the car or the springs, and you have to go into it each individually, and you're trying to match it up and it never lines up. So now you just change one and they all make sense. That's what I'm reading here.

Jeff: 50:42

That's cool, that's good, right?

Jason: 50:43

Yeah, man, for real. Uh, quality of life improvement to the Mercedes AMG GT3 2020 Garage ride height is now directly adjustable. Like the rest of the class. The the NSX GT3 Evo has an update to the rear wing arrow model that makes balance more sensitive to angle changes and also more similar to adjustments of the other cars in the class. Okay. And the BMW M4 GT3 Evo has a new engine model to more closely match the power and the engine braking curves provided by BMW. By BMW. Wow. By BMW. Tell me another sim. Tell me another sim that's doing this. Getting the mana, the freaking the the manufacturer to say, you know what, this is wrong. You're making my BMWs look bad. Come here. Alright, check it out. Improvements to the Corvette Z06 GT3R tire warm-up behavior. I have high hopes because the Corvette is one of those. They're not so popular, but they are freaking nice looking and they sound great. I I hope that they they can make this car have like its own series or something. And the and the NSX is a fairly new car, and they're just not being used that much. Of course, it's the number one freaking used and abused car. Then the Mustang, believe it or not, Mustang's really popular in iRacing now. And the rest is and the BNW, of course. Just everyone from Europe, no offense, Europe, love you guys. But you guys got this BNW on lock, especially on the Nurberg. There's a line of BMWs, just nothing but beamers out there. On Daytona, good luck. That beamer is not gonna help you much. You might want to run a Mercedes or something with good freaking speed. Well, actually, the beamer might be good. That's the thing. The beamer, the beamer is a beast. Uh so oval refresh continued oval refresh phase one, debuted in uh debuted, excuse me, in 2021, season one, and was focused on making oval racing more dynamic and realistic in terms of temperature grip, uh, multi-groove racing. At the time, we introduced, we intended to follow up with additional improvements over the next few seasons for a variety of reasons that didn't pan out as planned, and we had to slow down and reassess our next steps. This pivot was contrary to the expectations that I had set regarding the speed of delivery for phase two, and they apologize. So sorry. That said, I'm happy to share that we are fully back on track and positioned for improvements going forward. Starting with season one and season two. Um, let's see how final testing goes. As part of renewed uh the this renewed oval refresh focus, we explored how low how lane dynamics evolve through a race. This including, ooh, this is interesting. Lane dynamics evolving through a race. This included studying how rubber is laid down and picked up across different groups, as well as how the distribution and density of rubber affects lane performance. We reworked how thermal flow behaves within the track surface and varying uh levels of rubber saturation and how that interacts with grip. In parallel, we turned out how tires transfer energy into the track as they heat up and cool down over a run. These efforts enhance the lap to lap experience of oval racing, particularly as conditions evolve. So we are happy with the advancements and improvements these changes bring to realism, the on-track racing experience, and the decreased hypersensitivity of setups and track temperature. We will continue to push and advance our track modeling systems to bring ongoing improvements to oval racing and all forms of racing going forward.

Jeff: 54:57

Tell me another sim that does that that looks at like the hydrodynamic or what whatever aerodynamics of lanes and ovals and yeah, tell me another. Yeah, dude.

Jason: 55:10

I mean, this they don't have to continue to do this to be this is the level of care and effort that they're putting into this, and it makes me excited because what do you do in oval? You drive in a straight line most of the time. If it's a left and then straight, left and then straight. So over time, all that rubber starts to accumulate, right? More so than on a real track, than on than on regular road tracks, even more so in NASCAR. So for them to do it there, I'm excited because if they can get this right, then we will see that same love transferred over to everything else, you know, just at a just at a different intensity or level that may. So sim UI. We all love the new SIM UI. Um, so they're saying that they were thrilled to share it with us last season. We're using it. Our team invested a substantial amount of time, effort. Okay. The the team has returned to development trenches, building advanced new features to deliver to iRacers over the next coming months and years. The framework and technologies that power the new UI provide us with a platform for advancement in a way never before possible. In the past, UI changes in the new SIM were significantly gated by legacy technologies. So, what they're basically saying is uh with the new SIM UI, we have overcome significant barriers, allowing accelerated focus and delivery of new features and capabilities. In fact, our first round of additions will ship just three months short after the new UI debut uh and are substantial. So, what are they doing here? Adding a search button. Thank God with all the amount of things you can click on, the option menu we're significantly redesigning the UI, transforming. There's not much to say here, right? It's a search function.

Jeff: 57:23

It's clutch though. Content manager has one that's been saving me lately.

Jason: 57:28

So, oh yeah, it does. It does, but with that one, you gotta be exact. If you're one letter off, bro, it'll punish you. Trust me, I know. UI customization. Yeah, the new UI they debuted with support for a light level of UI customization. Okay, I think we already know this, right? We already know all of this. Multiple black boxes last season they tested multiple black boxes. These critical boxes provide information. Okay.

Jeff: 58:01

Uh we don't need to talk about it now, but black boxes don't they ruin my immersion.

Jason: 58:08

Yeah. So netcode. Uh most recently we deployed new connectivity related updates, including the network quality flag, which is the worst flag you could possibly see. If you see, get scared. Oh, yeah. Like seamlessly removes drivers with poor connections from a session to ensure smooth. And sometimes they might not be acting, it might not be accurate, they just yank you from the race.

Jeff: 58:34

So like you talk from experience or something.

Jason: 58:38

No, no, no, no, not yet. No, thank god.

Jeff: 58:40

It's nice. I haven't seen any cars like hovering and popping up and down and flying.

Jason: 58:44

Remember when they used to fly? This shit was funny though when they used to do that. So weather systems. Okay, you guys, we can we can skip all this. That it we already know what they've been working on. Ongoing development. Here we go. So audio. This tell me tell me what your feelings are on audio, please. Because I already know what they are.

Jeff: 59:09

One thing I know holistically that iRacing needs to improve on is the audio of the cars. This is like like you jump into a set of corsa, and the audio is like I know. Like it just is any other game, too. It just doesn't give that. Oh, and I think that um ACC has the most visceral sound.

Jason: 59:31

It's it's like it sounds violent, right?

Jeff: 59:35

Yeah, that's what Ace that iRacing is missing. It just doesn't have that reverb. Yeah, it just doesn't give that reverb like, oh, the car's alive, you know? Yeah, yeah. So let's talk about it.

Jason: 59:49

They're working on it. They're working on it. Let's talk about audio. Let's talk about it. Audio excellence has always been a priority for our team. And we have some of the most capable and experienced audio developers in the city. Simulation and gaming industry, that's okay. At its core, the audio experience of racing car, yeah, like yeah, okay. I can't even concentrate right now. You didn't even say that with a straight face. Bunch of bullshit, right? First line. Just let you know what just at its core, we'll start there. All right. Let's do it. At its core, the audio experience of racing cars isn't as important as the visual. We have advanced our capabilities over the years in significant areas, including in the field process. I will say this the newer cars, they're sounding a lot better than the old cars. We'll say that. Our capture hardware, post-processing, and our core audio architecture, which is still old as hell. However, we have encountered legacy technology-related barriers that have hindered the development of major audio-related features in the NSIM experience, such as single-thread audio architecture. We have spent the last couple of years researching what the hell re-architecting, excuse me, these systems to have more modern and multi-threaded architecture. And pleased to let you know that our first major new audio will soon be, that means it's not here. So we'll soon be here. To begin, we're adding a global reverb to each track. What did I just tell you, bro? This is the main the biggest thing they're missing is reverb. Reverb. Reverb is everything. Sound bounces, it travels off of buildings, off of cars, you know, depending on where you're at. If you're in a tunnel. That's why they that's why they know tunnels in Iris. This is why. Because they know they do. They know that sounds bullshit. This will integrate all of the ambient sounds so that they feel more natural. What this will not yet do is calculate the oh God, come on, guys. Calculate the line of sight of sound sources and provide occlusion. This is the fundamental work that allows us to have reverb in the sim. More improvements will be made later to simulate the different environments more accurately. We're also adding reverb to the interior of the cars. The reverb will be based on measurements that we've taken during our recording sessions. Cockpit, reburbs, colors, colors, external sounds, making them more natural and distinguishing them from the onboard sounds of the driver's car. Finally, we're adding zones of reburb to unique features such as tunnel. Oh, they have a tunnel at Suzuka, which is like two feet. Yeah. It's like a small little okay. And the stadium at the okay, the stadium in Mexico, if you can reverb through there, that would be awesome. It's like an overpass. Yeah. It's a chicane, and you're gone. All right. So we have, I know this episode is probably dragging, but this deserves the full honors. We will have a listen, we will have a join-in with the iRacing engineers and see what they got planned for us, man. So we're gonna do some show and tell here. I might have got my head of myself real quick. So it's 14 minutes, guys. If you want to skip this, skip 14. Well, like and subscribe.

Iracing: 1:03:41

G'day, I'm Ozzy Greg Hill. Um, I'm the lead sound designer here at iRacing, and you probably know me as the spotter. They say you cut the course, you'll have to slow down and give up the time gained. They say you cut the course, you'll have to slow down and give up the time gained. Yeah, so after we we um uh put together some uh vehicles in the first iteration of the iRacing title, we really seriously started working on how we can improve the sounds, and we were using the old direct sound uh API, but all along the audio was connected directly to the physics at all times. So all the amplitudes and the dynamics and forces and power of course they crack physical parameters go straight to the audio and um it makes it a really dynamic experience. So I like to think of it as I build the musical instrument that makes the sounds, and the physics are the hands that play that musical instrument when you're making decisions about what gear and uh the throttle, how much load there is on load. We have sounds for each of those different engine uh states of load, whether it be full throttle, whether it be just cruising or decelerating. All those sounds have been recorded and made into a sonic model. We not only record the interior of the car, we also record the close onboard, like under the hood, the exhaust intake, and we also record the car from track side. So we essentially make three sonic models that can call up every RPM from low RPM like idle all the way to maximum bumping off the rev limiter, um, with all throttle positions and all the physical parameters that that make up the load on the engine. So we're trying to improve that all the time, and we interstelled. Look at that rear wing and we managed to be able to freaking massive, bro. And use um, we had more sound channels. So it started to improve, and also our technology for recording was improving as well. So uh with the recording, get them boys now using really high SBR uh microphones that can handle really high sound pressure levels, so some of them can go as 150 dB, which is ridiculous. That's deafening. So we can get them pretty close to the donor parts of the cars. We've also just in the last couple of years of years, ambisonics, especially for the cockpit of the cars, so that we're now recording 360. So when we record, we're actually recording not only a full 360 uh circumference, but also above and below. Okay, the big question that everybody's asking is that when are we going to get reverb? I've wanted reverb for so long, yes, but we want to do it the right way. We don't want to use just off-the-shelf. Bro, you've had 15 years, you know, reverbs like you get from guitar pedals or sound studios that just use like hall reverb and plate reverb and those sorts of things. We want dynamic reverb that actually uh takes into account the space and the environment that it's within. So Rich um, we're aiming to use impulse responses and make up a matrix of sound so that you will actually hear the car in the distance probably occluded with a lot of um reflections, which we call reverb. And then um, as the car approaches, that will change dynamically. So it'll start bouncing off the local environment, and we will use a different impulse response for that. We'll also start using impulse response for the in-car cabin, because um, even though we go to great deals of uh trouble to record the cars, when you break sound down and reassemble it again, it does lose something. The grain or granular aspect of the sound uh is chopped up so much it loses its tail. So, what we're going to do is we're going to start using impulse responses so that the actual car interior resonates with the sound of the car. Now, there are some other studios that are doing this, but we want to model every single car accurately using impulse response pins. So hopefully we'll get that within the next couple of years. I'm not saying I'm not saying soon, but why is this taking years? And he's an absolute blessing. He's like light shining down on me at the moment because we're going to move audio into its own thread. At the moment, it's sharing a lot of the resources with physics, and physics wants to improve, and sound wants to improve. So we need to separate the two, not the way they communicate with each other, but we just want to be able to.

Jason: 1:09:12

I think I've seen enough, guys. Yeah, I think we've seen enough. We're not gonna that line right there, just completely killed it for me because it it really did, you know. So this is probably one of the biggest challenges, right? With iRacing, and is sometimes the wait can be long, but I mean, come on, there's other sims doing this, you know. You you clearly know what you're talking about when you said reverb. Uh but anyway, let's move on. We're almost done here. So sim UI. Okay, let's see. Uh, there's anything else that we can talk about. Niana Planning and Development. We've also been investigating the UI team itself. I've been hired additional developers, so they're hiring more help. Please do that. New graphics engine. Oh, we've been first time running the new rendering uh engine together as a group. What's a therapy?

Jeff: 1:10:17

Let's go.

Jason: 1:10:18

I know. White, white, it's all white. Give me anxiety. Okay, so they got a nice little all right. I see you.

Jeff: 1:10:27

Just tell us when you're gonna give it to us, huh? I don't mean to be poignant here, but yeah.

Jason: 1:10:33

Says here the new rendering engine project has been making some good progress through the months. I wouldn't say substantial, because substantial means we're gonna see it in an update. We're gonna let's see it. The team building is next level and truly special. This has been part of apparent uh since the project began. But it was driven home just how fortunate we are. Okay, back in September, we've gathered in Copenhagen, uh, Denmark to meet as a full team for the first time in person. Okay, we don't need to know why Copenhagen, guys. We just want to know. It sounds like they met in Copenhagen, you can see here, and our major milestone is to achieve what is called a vertical slice. The vertical slice will be a focus project aimed at achieving initial feature completion on the core building blocks of the new renderer, specifically applied to one car and one track. The project will exercise all key areas of the project and act as a tool to advance towards a critical project milestone. We expect to reach vertical slice in Q1 of next year. That said, full completion is still ways off, and we appreciate your patience. Of course you do, while we continue development through 2026. By the way, okay, okay.

Jeff: 1:12:02

So what I read from that is maybe end of 26. Maybe.

Jason: 1:12:08

See, these are content plans and some career mode and physicus updates.

Jeff: 1:12:15

Uh all right.

Jason: 1:12:19

Um let me just make sure I'm not missing anything. Looks like TCR class overall has been underway since last update. This two season project will debut in season two. Steve Myers produced a subtle hint on his. Okay, these are just I think we're done here. Uh Winchester Speedway is back in production, and that's about it. The group of questions here. All right, that's gonna I know, I know.

Jeff: 1:12:49

I give it like a drag down a little bit. What do we give? What do you give it this this for this update? I'm giving it like a B minus.

Jason: 1:12:59

I wouldn't call it a B, bro. We got the cup car. I don't know, man. Uh I'd say that's a B minus.

Jeff: 1:13:08

I used to be proud of having an 82.

Jason: 1:13:11

We had a massive update three months ago, and then another massive update three months before that, and then it's been every three months we see something big happen. But I I I do I'm a little frustrated with the audio. I don't think that, in my opinion, graphics should be second back seat compared. Audio should be your number one. Yeah, forget about for iRacing. Forget about NASCAR, forget about the damn specs on the road, forget about all that junk. Listen, get the damn audio up to par with the other sims because it's a big, it's a big um, how do you say this? It's a big thing that we use, right? It's an sound is important to sim racers. I can see the cars already, I can see the track already. That's beautiful castle in the distance, but we're flying by it at 150 miles and I don't care about the stupid castle or the rubber on the road, or yes, give me physics, but I want I need sound. Sound ties together with physics. It's like brother and sister, you know what I mean?

Jeff: 1:14:20

Yeah, it's interesting that they have all this technology, you know. With the he talked about the 360 audio and you know, these these devices that can pick up 50, you know, 150 dB. Is ACC doing that? And their audio is.

Jason: 1:14:35

I know, right?

Jeff: 1:14:36

Kill now now. Are they overdoing it? Maybe, but it sounds awesome, you know?

Jason: 1:14:42

Like well, they well well what they could have done was just take a sample, use the same technique, update everybody on the sound, give us some decent sound, and then in the background, you can do all this research and development to make it sound accurate, to make it sound proper. But just saying, uh yeah, it's gonna take about six years uh before we see an update to the sound. That means that I'm stuck with 2008 sound to 2030. Yeah, so we're fans of the service, but we will grill it when it needs, when things need to be grilled, we will grill them, just like we grill steak. If I see steaks and they need grilling, we will grill them immediately. And again, another typical i racing episode. We are well past our time here. So Jeff, I think I mean, overall thoughts, I I think it's I think it's great. I mean, I wish it was a little more, I guess. Only one car is a little weak, right? We usually see three cars. Yeah. Uh was it's been the trend.

Jeff: 1:15:54

Yeah, I don't want to say B minus is terrible. It just okay. I'm not complaining about the update because I'm happy we're getting new stuff, and I'm not gonna complain, but it's just not like blowing my hair back like last one did.

Jason: 1:16:07

Well, the new the new um, what is that car called? The new off-road car, that looks cool, man. Oh, the the cross FI cross car?

Jeff: 1:16:16

Yeah, X cross or something, yeah.

Jason: 1:16:17

Probably cross something. We've already forgotten.

Jeff: 1:16:19

That was cool.

Jason: 1:16:20

I I mean it's free, so I mean that is technically a car, right? And then some updates to cars that are already on the service. Yeah.

Jeff: 1:16:29

So I guess they're they got the you know, the the the the terrain on the sides that they're revamping and stuff like that. But like I said, it's just interesting, just not compelling. You know, it just is like okay, cool, thanks.

Jason: 1:16:44

Maybe it's the type of people that we are is I like to see results. I don't like to see, I don't care if you guys built a wall. Show me the room built. Okay, Google, the the room is built.

Jeff: 1:16:59

What about the Wi-Fi network? You might want to check the connection settings in the Google Home app.

Jason: 1:17:04

You see what I mean? That Google coming out of respect. We're gonna leave that in. We're gonna leave that in. I'm gonna show you how disrespectful things can be. I even disconnected her from the Wi-Fi, and she's still acting up. I don't know what I'm gonna do with this thing. I'm gonna probably I'll probably rip it off the wall.

Jeff: 1:17:20

AI taking over, man. Can't live with it, can't live without it.

Jason: 1:17:23

Oh, that's another thing they can use. They can use AI algorithm, and I know that's very frowned upon, but it's way better than the freaking sound that we have.

Jeff: 1:17:33

Yeah, it just is to your point. Give me something. It's just frustrating when I'm being told, like, oh, we're working it, and it's gonna take a while.

Jason: 1:17:41

Like, yeah, that was a wrong thing to him to say that. Yeah, that that that that guy would have been fired because you said years. You say, Yeah, we're working on it. We'll probably uh it's coming soon. A few years, I hope they're wrong. I just hope they're wrong. Yeah, I hope they can take their funds and and use a little more to get things quicker to us. They don't have to, though. That's the thing. The service is alive, the service works, people love the service. So we still have to exactly we still have to, there is a balance, right, between that and what matters to many people. You know, you and I ever you F1 is everything in the world to you. So if they had F1 cars, this would be a 10 out of 10. And for someone be like, I don't care about F1.

Jeff: 1:18:33

You know what I mean? If they drop the F1 car in there and like never updating audio ever again, deal with it. I'd be like 10 out of 10. 10 out of 10. So I guess it's all perspective. That's a great point.

Jason: 1:18:46

I just think that, and I agree with you, I think that NASCAR is getting way too much love than what it deserves. No offense to the NASCAR guys out and girls out there, but come on, man. You guys have had NASCAR updates for literally since I've been racing on iRacing, which is now two years. And the reason why I know that is because I renewed my subscription. So I added another two years, and that's another discount, guys. If if you missed it, iRacing is 25% off for the regulars and 50%. I don't quote me, right? Is this I think it is. I think it is for new people. So just check, check the website. Um, throughout the month of November, so take advantage, take advantage you to um the sound is okay, sound is all right. I just it could be more. It it could be more, could be better. Yeah, if you race the new cars, they sound significantly better, but there's no reverb, and I would love because what you're hearing in ACC is a heck ton of reverb and bass, and the car getting beat down to hell and going down the track is is no joke. I actually have to turn the volume down because it's so damn loud, you know. I racing, I can crank it a little, but yeah, that's gonna be it for today for this week. And Jeff, do you have anything else before we uh take off here?

Jeff: 1:20:12

No, I hope everybody has a uh a great week. And uh is this the last one before Thanksgiving? Not yet. No, we got one bar. Okay, all right, so we can save those comments.

Jason: 1:20:21

But anyway, wait, no, no, no, wait, wait, you might be right over there.

Jeff: 1:20:24

I think it is, right? Yeah, yeah. No, it isn't. Nope.

Jason: 1:20:27

Yeah, it is because this episode will air on the 24th. So that means you won't hear from us until December 1st. So happy Thanksgiving. Oh, all right. I guess happy Thanksgiving. I hope you had plenty of turkey and leftovers and spent some time with the family. And yeah.

Jeff: 1:20:49

Uh and turn a couple laps, everybody. Get in the rip some laps. So drive fast and brake late, everybody, and happy Thanksgiving. And drive there you go.

Jason: 1:20:59

Um, don't don't drink and drive in real life, just drink and drive in the rig.

Jeff: 1:21:03

There you go. Safe alternative.

Jason: 1:21:05

And hide the keys. Don't go nowhere. Uber, uber, it's cheaper. Safe cheaper. Anyways, happy Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving, Jeff. I still owe you the coquito. If if you know, you know. If you don't, you don't. But uh I'll probably start making that this weekend. Uh hit you up on the weekend. Let's go. All right. And with that, guys, have a great start of your week. Thank you.