As a direct ancestor of iRacing, the ‘Grand Prix Legends engine’ had multiple stock car racing false starts, before eventually releasing as NASCAR Racing 4. The original NASCAR 3, cancelled and replaced by one that used NASCAR 2’s engine, is barely remembered.
This American studio was formed by David Kaemmer (co-founder of Papyrus) and John W. Henry (at the time owner of the Boston Red Sox and avid sim racer – he has since added NASCAR team ownership and more) after Papyrus was shut down by Vivendi, owners of Sierra, in 2004.
iRacing acquired the NASCAR Racing 2003 Season software engine (itself an evolution of Grand Prix Legends), pushed groundbreaking track technology for home use and developed a Web-based front end where users could easily find races in a variety of vehicle-types using the iRacing service.
The company has acquired a number of other studios, most notably Monster Games.