So there I was — a 2-liter bottle of water and snacks by the side of me, and that buzz you get before sinking your teeth into a 24-hour endurance race. As the lobby populated on iRacing, I felt an air of confidence embracing the leather of the Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race wheel and pushing down on the balanced pedal system.
Was my confidence well placed? Mostly. You see, this $649 direct drive rig is all about emphasis on key areas at the expense of others. Turtle Beach has picked the right areas in my mind, but those small compromises and choices can sometimes be distracting.
For example, thanks to some important firmware updates to the force feedback, I got precise haptic knowledge of every potential degree of understeer to correct in my Touring Car with no latency. On top of that, the comfort levels of that hand-stiched leather meant I was able to race the night away for the long stints I competed for. But the button box is a bit of a gimmick and the telemetry display has very limited compatibility across games.
Going further south, the pedals have that nice metallic feel that's satisfying under your foot, those pesky latency problems are gone with the update too, and the small amounts of customizability are ideal to get them just right. However, the load cell pedal’s pressure doesn’t really mount up until you’re basically fully pressed and the plastic shell around the base does bend a lot when you’re hammering the pedals.
But in the race, once you get used to the feel of the wheel and pedals, you can really start to feel at one with your virtual car. Throw in the $129 VelocityOne Multi-Shift and you can really start to introduce some versatility into the kinds of sim racing you do — whether it’s getting the immersive feel of a traditional H-shift on track, or flipping it into a level handbrake for WRC races.
And while yes, there are those small warning signs you need to know about, what underpins it all is that all of this is $778. This perfectly fills the void for any intermediate racer looking to jump up from a cheaper wheel into something to really explore this hobby. It may have started rough with plenty of trips to the pits last year, but this is a combo breaker of value and performance that can take the chequered flag now.
Just a shame that it’s only compatible with Xbox and PC!
Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race: Cheat Sheet
- What is it? This is a direct drive sim racing wheel and pedals (the gear shifter comes separately).
- Who is it for? The VelocityOne Race is for intermediate sim racers — hobbyists that graduate past beginner and need something with direct drive that doesn’t cost over $1,000.
- What does it cost? The wheel and pedal set costs $649/£629. The multi-shift is an optional extra that sets you back $129/£119.
- What do we like? This is a great-feeling racing experience with respectably powerful direct drive force feedback, alongside a comfortable backlit wheel, and pedals that have a nice amount of strength to them. Plus, the multi-purpose gear shifter makes it perfect for rally cross games to diversify what racing you do.
- What don’t we like? The button box looks cool, but feels like a gimmick. The telemetry display is very hit and miss when it comes to compatibility with games. And the plastic base of the pedals does bend quite a bit under the pressure of braking.
Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race: Specs
Turtle Beach Velocity One Race: The ups
So, the green flag waved and after keeping my nose clean of all the first lap chaos, I got into the rhythm of my endurance race and started to learn to appreciate a whole lot more about the VelocityOne Race.
A top drive
Let’s start with the obvious question: how does it handle? When the VelocityOne launched, it was a rough experience of poorly optimized force feedback and pedal latency. Fortunately, with a few updates under its sleeve, this is no longer the case.
The 7.2nm of direct drive strength may not be 1:1 to real racing, but it’s far more than enough to provide the strength and detail needed to really get a clear feel for your car — being able to identify the small indications of oversteer to correct, and notice when your brakes are locking.
It gives you a nice level of confidence to push and find the peak level of performance you can in the car. And that pedal set has nice big aluminum faces to welcome your feet, along with tunable spring pressure to push back against you too. I prefer mine on the slightly stronger side to really get into the miniscule percentage changes in acceleration to trail brake my way in and out of a corner.
After a couple hours of getting acquainted with this wheel’s forces, you can easily settle into a good consistent flow in any race, whether as long or as short as mine. Then it’s time to move on over to the Multi-Shift.
This is a new optional accessory that gives you the versatility of being either a seven-speed H gearbox, a sequential shifter or even a handbrake. With hall-effect magnetic tech, every gear shift or pull of the brake feels as satisfying as I imagine it is for Dominic Toretto to aggressively change gears in his Dodge Charger.
It’s the first shifter to truly get me into rally games, which is quite a big breakthrough for a track racer like me!
Thoughtfully gorgeous design
It got to about hour nine of my endurance race — my second stint. By this point, I’m usually feeling the fatigue of using an uncomfortable wheel and struggling to see the buttons by night. However, the Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race has thought of all this.
This all starts with backlighting. Buttons and dials are thoughtfully placed across the face and sides of the wheel’s center column for muscle memory, but at the height of your tiredness, it’s easy to lose your place. The lighting can literally guide your way to any key tweaks to brake balance, and it's customizable in brightness and color to match the theme of your whole setup.
On top of that, the plush leather steering wheel is really comfortable to grip with the tactile yellow stitching that gives this a great sports car look that you can drive for hours and hours.
Follow that with the metal pedals that feel rigid to every push, that button box that makes you feel like a full blown fighter pilot in ‘Top Gun,’ and the whisper quiet operation of that direct drive (something that normally comes with either fan noise or a lot of audio feedback), then you’ve got a thoughtfully designed wheel — packed into a sleek chassis.
Oh, and while many wheels now come with the required Allen key to attach it to a sim rig, VelocityOne Race is the first I’ve seen to come with a compartment to keep your Allen keys. It’s a really thoughtful implementation for someone like me who easily loses everything!
Real value for money
Let’s just take a second to really appreciate what you get here, because while I can go ahead and compare this to the Logitech G Pro and really discern the differences here in detail of force feedback, snappiness of the shifters and the quality of the pedals, this often gets missed.
You can get all the sim racing equipment any intermediate driver needs for $649… Let that sink in. For something with this 7.2nm force feedback, you could be paying that much just for the wheel alone. So to get both the wheel with a display, backlighting and a button box (more on that later), plus customizable pedals with a decent load cell brake is crazy good value for money.
It may not be a professional’s wheel with a big cost but this overperforms compared to its price.
Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race: The downs
It’s hour 18. We’re nowhere near the front, so by this point it’s all about maintaining our track position with consistency. Getting into that hypnotic state, I took the time to think about the problems with this wheel, and it all comes down to compromises for cost and compatibility.
That plastic pedal base causes concern
So yes, the entire pedal base isn't plastic. There are metal elements here and there, but the bottom is all plastic. What happens when you put an intensive load cell brake pedal on a thin plastic base? Simple, you get a lot of bending.
On a sim rig, this won’t be a problem, as it’s flatly screwed against a metal plate. But if the pedals hang over the edge or you’re using them on the floor, that bend may not be something you can feel in the race, but it’s something you can worry about in terms of the longevity of these pedals.
I wish I could love the button box more
I mean look at it. Flicking a bunch of switches to turn on the car and its various racing elements is cool as hell. But at the end of the day, I used it once then never used it again. It was a fun additional element that did not get touched.
That’s not to say it’s entirely useless. I’m sure some players can map controls to it to make it make sense. But for all the games I tried, I just didn’t need it or want to use it. And speaking of games where things are not needed, that RMD telemetry display on the wheel itself has very ropey compatibility. Xbox games are basically a write off, and it works on a small number of PC titles.
Without the developer incentive to support this, you’ll just be looking at your acceleration and brake input pressures for most of it. That’s a bit of a let down.
Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race: Verdict
So all of this puts the Turtle Beach VelocityOne — a dramatic step up from the more basic likes of the Logitech G923 wheel, and a step down from the uber premium heights of the Logitech G Pro or Fanatec GT DD Extreme. It’s a mid-ranger with some serious value for money as it gives you everything you need in the box.
Not only that, but it’s pretty damn good at what it does. The wheel base delivers strong, accurate direct drive feedback through that comfortable backlit wheel. Looking beyond the plastic base of the pedals, they do have a nice force to them to feel grounded in what you do.
When it comes to taking sim racing to the next level, this is one of the best-priced packages to do it. And if ever you wanted to step into rallying, the multi-shift is an excellent additional accessory.
Oh, and that race? We…well we didn’t do so well. I’d rather not talk about it, but at least I had a great wheel to race it with.
