Sim racing can transfer useful skills to a real racing car. Max Verstappen and Chris Lulham provide recent examples, while motorsport simulator research shows that drivers adapt their control strategies to the cues available in a virtual environment. What public evidence cannot yet tell us is whether the fastest technique in iRacing, Le Mans Ultimate, Assetto Corsa Competizione or Assetto Corsa EVO matches the technique used in the corresponding real car. There is good support for the transfer of circuit knowledge, setup understanding and aspects of driving technique. There is also strong reason to expect differences. A static home simulator removes much of the physical information available inside a racing car, particularly sustained acceleration and G-forces. The unanswered question is more specific: When a driver becomes fast in a simulator, what control strategy has that simulator taught them to use? Driving behaviour can be measured, not just described A 2020 study from Graz University of Technology examined behavioural validity in motorsport Driver-in-the-Loop simulation by comparing professional racing drivers on a real circuit and in a simulator. The researchers used metrics derived from track and simulator data to quantify the distance between the driver’s behaviour in both environments. Absolute behavioural validity ranged from 40.47% to 59.29% across the drivers and simulator configurations tested. Activating the simulator’s motion system shifted behaviour by between 1.29% and 3.31% towards the characteristics measured on track. Those percentages are measures produced by that specific methodology. They are not a percentage score for how “realistic” the simulator was. The useful finding is that driver behaviour changed with simulator configuration and that change could be quantified. A 2026 study shows how drivers adapt to simulator cues Further research published in Automotive Innovation in February 2026 examined motion cueing using amateur participants and two professional racing drivers in a