Get to Know: Justin Lindsay (Part 2)

Two weeks ago readers had the chance to learn about iRacer Justin Lindsay, the 31 year old sim racing out of Cincinnati, Ohio. An accomplished road racer on iRacing, having won 93 career races in 825 starts, and Pro/WC licensed driver, Lindsay has come a long way since winning his first career race at Okayama International Circuit in the Mazda Cup car.

Earlier this year, Lindsay was able to achieve something no other person on iRacing will be able to achieve…….besides three other people. Lindsay joined Coanda Simsport teammates Paul R Williams, Martin Krönke and Mitchell deJong to run a combined total of 874 laps and win the top split of the inaugural iRacing.com 24 Hours of Daytona, the virtual counterpart of the Rolex 24 at Daytona. The race, which started on the final day of January and ended in the early morning hours on February 1, saw three different cars lead the race, with the Coanda Simsport HPD ARX-01c  leading the majority of the race and Lindsay himself leading 99 laps.

In the final installment of my Q&A with Justin Lindsay, we went back in time to January 31^st, 2015 and relived the 24 hour endurance race through his perspective. Read all about it in this week’s edition of Get to Know…

Q:        Recently Coanda Simsport competed in, and won the iRacing 24 Hours of Daytona – who drove in the car along with you?

A:        Our Daytona 24 Hour team was made up of three Coanda Simsport drivers: Martin Krönke, Mitchell deJong, and myself. Our fourth driver for the event was guest driver Paul R. Williams, of the Vergil Racing Team. Coanda Simsport also fielded a car in the GT3 field, driven by Coanda Simsport drivers Rens Broekman, Jörn Jens, Markus Lendermann, and Philip Stamm.

Q:        How did Coanda Simsport start? How did the team form?  Was it for the sole purpose of competing in the Daytona 24 Hour.)

A:        Answering this question in reverse order, Coanda Simsport was not formed for the purpose of running the Daytona 24, and truth be told it was not even for certain that we would field an HPD until a day or two before the event. Coanda Simsport was formed out of the restructuring and rebranding of My3id, and the main focus of our team is on the iRacing World Championship Grand Prix Series. During the iWCGPS’ off-season, Coanda Simsport competes in various endurance events, such as the NEO Endurance, and Masters of Endurance series.

Q:        When was your stint during the race? How were you feeling before and after your stint(s)?

A:        During the Daytona 24 Hour event, I did two back-to-back double-stints, the first double-stint around three-hours into the race, and the last double-stint some six-hours later. As to how I was feeling before the first stint, I’d say I was more than a bit apprehensive; the HPD is not a car I am accustomed to driving, and Daytona International Speedway road course is a track on which I had never driven.

Lindsay and his Coanda Simsport teammates carved a place for themselves in sim racing history by winning the inaugural iRacing.com 24 Hours of Daytona.

Q:        When you weren’t racing, what were you doing during the race? Take us through the final minutes of the race from your perspective.

A:        During the time between my two-stints I attended to real-world chores. I had intended to log off and go to bed after my last stint. Unfortunately, during Mitchell deJong’s stint, there was an incident where a RUF crashed exiting Turn One and, after hitting the pit-wall, rolled across the track, striking our car. The damage incurred was too severe to be repaired at our next pit-stop, so we had to battle on for the remainder of the event with a mishandling car that was lacking a dozen km/h on the oval-section of the course.

From this moment onward I was affixed to the ever decreasing gap we had over second place, knowing that once they got within drafting distance of our car, they would shoot past us on the oval portion of the track with ease, and because we were vMax limited, there would be nothing we could do about it. This uncertainty kept me up for the remainder of the race, and it was not until eleven o’clock the following Sunday morning that I finally went to bed.

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