Please introduce yourself, tell us about you (age, nationality, profession) and how you became a simracer
I was born in july 1968 in a city in central greece called "trikala". done a lot of jobs when i was younger.
I've meat a dutch girl in the early '90s and followed her in the beautiful utrecht, the netherlands, where worked as a DJ, orderpicker, food delivery and later as a cook in some greek restaurants.
after some years changing jobs and places i opened my first greek restaurant. together with my partners i had 9 restaurants and bars in total all those years in the netherlands and germany . i consider my self very lucky to sell most of my shares few weeks before covid came and since then im back in greece.
i have a daughter and 2 sons, all living in germany.
I started gaming in general in the mid '80s, always liked it but never had enough time for it.
I remember playing grand turismo with a gamepad in ps1... bougth my first wheel, a logitech FFB with 180 DoR to play simbin's GTR. i think it was 2005 or 06?
for a man on the move, like me, its difficult to have the PC (and the "rig") with me most of the time. (gaming) laptops was way easier. so actually i became a simracer the last ~3 years.
How long have you played ACC ?
About a year ?
Tell us how the idea of the eSeniors came to you ?
Found a post (i think from jeremie) in kunos forums
How was it racing in the Eseniors Championship ?
It's great. believe it or not, i had not more than 10 MP races before eseniors! my first race it was in barcelona, warm up. i was so emparassed to bump mr feher in T5, can not forget it...
i even made a vid with apologies about it.
before eseniors did not liked races in ACC (not even vs the AI) so much, most of my time i done hotlaps. since the first time in eseniors i gone from ~50 hours of playtime to 1200 hrs (and counting). i open ACC only for eseniors (practice, testing liveries, racing, spectating). i also watch almost all streams.
How many hours did you spend preparing yourself for a Race, and why is it important ?
I do a lot of practice, as i said i love to be alone on the track trying to beat my self. why its important? because i enjoy it as much as the actual race, if not more.
What kind of equipment do you use (wheel, pedals, PC, screen, etc) ?
Thrustmaster t300 and TLCM pedals. mounted on a desk. a confy chair from my living room and often my wife as a buttkicker LOL. not so immersive but i can feel the Gs... ROFL
My potato PC has an intel SB i5 2500k (great chip) OCed @ 4700GHz for 10+ years now, on air cooling, sitting on an also 10+ yo asrock z77 extreme 4, 8GB of DDR3 RAM @1600GHz, a radeon 570 8GB all powered form a 10+ yo seasonic 650W gold and a 26" 120Hz 1080p benq monitor. 3.5TB of SSD storage. win11, 2x win10, elementary OS (linux) multiboot.
Do you buy setups or do you setup your car alone ?
I dont buy setups. sometimes I tweak the default aggressive and im lucky enough that friends from our league sharing their setups.
What makes you faster than the rest?
Nothing? despite my many hours in practice, i dont have the talent, it seems.
What is you favorite car and why ?
I like beautiful cars. dont care that much for specs and performance, i always go for the looks. that means, obviously, the aston martin vantage V8 GT3! shes is a beauty, the guy who designed her is an artist.
of course the porsches, BMWs and the merc evo. classic beautiful designs.
i love the sounds of the lambo. i wish she was pretty... LOL
What is you favorite circuit (s) and why ?
Easy: imola. has any kind of turn you want. great flow. love tambourello, the villeneuves, mineralli. being there twice, not in a race but just visiting the park. i drove the GP circuit with a bicycle!
love the maggotts and becketts in silverstone. the first sector of suzuka. the downhill at panorama, all for the same reason: sequential turns with great flow.
Who are your childhood racing heroes ?
Stig Blomqvist, Ari Vatanen, Kevin Schwantz, Nelson Piquet and of course Nigel Mansell.
What is the best advice you would to give to a simracer ?
1) join a league.
2) a race is a great opportunity to (enjoy) practice
3) if your race is "ruined" and you think "so many hours practicing wasted..." then maybe you are in the wrong simulator. practice in sim racing is not wasted time IMO. is the 95% of the deal. maybe you should try sim city or farm simulator?
4) GL HF
Are you satisfied with the Eseniors organization, and do you have suggestions to help bring a higher level of competition ?
I'm very satisfied! admins job is very hard and it pays.
I'm not here only for the competition so i dont know (or really care TBH) how to raise the already high levels we have.
though, for more fun and safety, i would like more races with big window mandatory pitstop(s). love the strategy elements mandatory pitstops bringing in our races!
less rain, less night races: if in real life racing organizers could setup the weather they would never for any reason chose to race in rain!
and more dryovercast, LOL
And finally, the most important question...how many speeding tickets have you accumulated to date ?
Only 1.
