Community Spotlight is back! The popular column that explores the varied world of SimGrid’s affiliated hosts today brings you to discover oNiD Community Racing. oNiD was founded back in 2021 and since then it has grown to become a big community, with over 50 people working behind the scenes. They organise a great variety of sim racing events and championships, both on PC and consoles.
oNiD: From Lockdown Races To A Thriving Community
oNiD Community Racing as we know it today was founded in January 2021, but as it often happens, there is a nice background story that traces back to the pandemic period. Of course, we all remember those days as a dreadful period, but at the same time as a sort of ‘golden age’ for sim racing activities. With everyone forced to stay at home as much as possible, racing online with friends was one of the few relieves we had.
“oNiD originally was a Project Cars 2 league called the Friday Night League, which started in the summer of 2020 with a group of 12 friends racing on a Friday because we could not go to our local sim centre due to Covid-19”, Jonny Ashley, founder of the community, explained. “In January 2021 we decided to create oNiD community racing to host a race or 2 for people we had met in other communities. This spiralled into what oNiD is today with over 4000 members racing with us across PC and Console on various different Sim titles”.
Who’s Behind The Scenes?
“Willingness to listen to the community, taking in board their ideas and suggestions, and the ability to adapt and change as required” are the secret ingredients to build such a successful community, as Jonny told SimGrid. This whole process led to a big racing community, active on both PC and consoles. At the helm of oNiD, alongside Jonny, there are Dave Szalecki, Ben Brown and Paul Clayton.
But the staff significantly grew over time. Today the community can count on over 50 volunteers that help run activities in various different roles such as stewarding, broadcasting, commentating or administrating leagues. These are indeed big numbers, but they should not really surprise considering the amount of events that are run by oNiD.
Active Championships And Future Plans
PC or console, newbie or alien, AC or ACC – oNiD has got you covered. “Our Sunday championships on PC-ACC have been a staple for oNiD since day dot and usually involve GT3s or Multiclass racing”, Jonny explained. But there is much more on the table than that.
The series offers coaching and competitive class racing for those who are new to ACC or sim racing in general. The championship has quickly become one of the most popular within the community and also serves as a gateway for new members.What about the future? “Our overall future plan is to be a leading community on SimGrid. One of the places to go for sim racing. Event wise oNiD are stronger than ever, hosting events on ACC PC, ACC Crossplay, the OG AC and AMS2. You can check out the oNiD Racing profile right here.
