Champion sim car racer Madison Down takes his talent to the track

LIKE a lot of 19-year-old boys, Madison Down is fanatical about playing motor racing video games.

Sim racing driver Madison Down, from Camden South, is a 7 time international Sim driving champion and he also won a drive in ...

LIKE a lot of 19-year-old boys, Madison Down is fanatical about playing motor racing video games.

Unlike a lot of 19-year-old boys, Down is a seven-time international champion, sponsors pay him money to get exposure on his virtual car and he races international opponents in an organised racing league 48 weeks per year.

Naturally Down's passion started with video games like Need For Speed and Gran Turismo but for most kids playing video games doesn't equate to a career or indeed a track racing debut in the V8 Supercars support category at the Sydney 500 at Olympic Park last month.

The Camden South gamer has been racing competitively since 2008 and races on a racing simulator called iracing in the V8 Supercars series.

The intensely and evenly contested racing is even broadcast on youtube and there are links from the mainstream V8 Supercars website.

After he won a national sim racing competition he was thrust into the foreign world of his first track racing experience.

Down was given a drive in the Aussie racing cars V8 Supercar support category as part of the prize for winning the competition.

"It was a massive jump into the deep endand I was really nervous to say the least," he said.

"It was an amazing experience and I couldn't be happier with how the debut went."

"I finished midpack and didn't crash - it was great."

After the ultimate racing teaser, Down has now set his sights on a track racing career.

"I'd love to be able get a full-time drive, it'd be great to be able to race something, but you have to scrape together so much money to even race in support categories."

Down said there wasn't a lot of crossover between being a good sim driver and a good racing driver.

"There is quite a big difference, giving yourself that sense of speed is difficult in sim racing, but the mental aspects of high concentration certainly correlate with track driving," he said.

Despite the Oran Park racetrack now being home to housing estates, Down still rates it as his favourite track.

"My dad used to take me to Oran Park and it's where I got my love of motorsport from, even though it doesn't exist anymore we still race the circuit on the simulators, so that's really cool for me."