Two pro drivers raced against each other while wearing VR headsets—here's what they saw

Here's a first — two professional drivers raced each other in virtual reality, in real time, and in real race cars.

How does that even work? Ben Collins, a precision stunt driver, and Matt Powers, a formula drift professional driver, got in race cars on two separate tracks. They then put on clunky, virtual reality helmets so that they could compete side-by-side on a virtual race track.

But the virtual reality race track was far from ordinary.

Here's a look at the Titanium Strong Virtual Racers challenge, which was sponsored by motor oil company Castrol:

SEE ALSO: Virtual reality will replace smartphones, says Oculus founder

The racers were on separate, physical tracks in Los Angeles, California.

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But they were side-by-side on a virtual reality race track, which was dubbed the VR track island.

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Although they weren't on the same physical track, both racers were given the same layout via their virtual reality headsets.