Last year, Rockstar released a free update that added impressive stunt races full of floating racetracks and large jumps. That update was so good, it became one of my favourite things to do in GTA Online. Fortunately, Rockstar has now added 15 wild new stunt races to the repertoire, and they’re excellent as well.
These new races seem to be more outrageous than previous stunt races: expect more loops, bigger jumps and crazier track layouts. One of the races even has you driving up the side of skyscrapers.
The new stunt races are a nice mix of motorcycles and cars, depending on what you like. In general, it feels like Rockstar is pushing players to go farther than ever before with these new races. There are bigger jumps and ramps, yes, but the races are also sprinkled with smaller and tighter jumps. In my time trying them out, I saw many drivers miss their jumps or overshoot their landings.
In general, the races feel more dangerous thanks to steeper angles, tighter turns and long stretches of track without any railing. Even when I’m all alone and in the middle of the road, turns without railing freak me out. I’ve screwed those turns up multiple times because I just get in my own head too much and over-correct, then shoot off the track to my death.
The track layouts are more complex as well. For example, one of my favourite motorcycle tracks is named 45°, and it includes a long downward sloped straight away with no railing on either side.At one point I knocked my friend off the track and watched them fly off. They laughed and popped back up and got back on the track. It turns out that hidden on either side of the downward straightaway is a road dotted with a few ramps. If you get knocked off, you get a second chance.
Another cool track layout is found in Big M, another motorcycle track that includes dozens of splits where the player can go left or right. While we’ve seen this trick in previous races, Big M has a huge number of these choices, making it a chaotic (but fun!) mess.
If you are into loops, you should check out Green Machine. One section of the race throws three loops back-to-back-to-back. The first time I got to this part, I I came out the other end a bit woozy.
What I really enjoyed about these tracks was a sense of surprise, as the races are willing to throw all sorts of curveballs at the player. For example, during one of the new stunt races I reached a long straight away, so naturally I put the pedal to the metal. At the end of the straight away this was waiting for me:
Stuff like this makes people yell in excitement during races. I got such a kick out of the reactions from strangers that I wish I could just watch other people deal with obstacles and jumps as an observer. Instead, I found myself crashing during races as I looked back on other players, to see how they dealt with some of the more extraordinary elements of the tracks.
While there are a few tracks that aren’t incredible, none of them were boring. Thus, it’s a good time to jump back into GTA Online, especially given that Rockstar is doing a double XP and cash event for ALL stunt races. This includes the old tracks too. The event ends March 13th and just for logging in you get this sweet pink racing suit.
Rockstar isn’t done with Stunt Races yet. They just announced that they are releasing a series of stunt race tracks that utilise the recently added special vehicles, like the rocket car. I can only imagine what crazy stunts GTA Online fans will pull off on those tracks.
For now, the full list of new stunt races is below, along with a link to the Rockstar Social Club website so you can bookmark them for later. Or you can just use this playlist I made that contains all the new tracks.
A couple of other thoughts:
- Racing with a small group of friends will still earn you money and is a good way to get a feel for each of the tracks before moving on to more chaotic 16 player races.
- Keep an eye out for smaller details. For example, on the track Around The Docks you can see cranes holding pieces of track, as if they just got done building it.
Comments