Guide
Racing
Racing is not bolted onto the side of the game. It uses the same flight model you travel with, on the islands you already visit, against the clock and against everyone who has ever run the course. There is no lobby and no waiting. A circuit starts when you do.
Three circuits
Each floating island carries one circuit, and they get longer and higher as they get harder:
| Circuit | Opens at | Checkpoints | Altitude band |
|---|---|---|---|
| Expert Riding | Level 15 | 6 | Around 100–150 m |
| Artisan Riding | Level 20 | 8 | Around 130–200 m |
| Dragonflight | Level 25 | 10 | Around 150–250 m |
The level gates are not arbitrary. Your altitude ceiling grows as you level, and each circuit needs the ceiling its gate grants, so the gate and the altitude band are two ways of saying the same thing. Racing is a reward for having progressed, and a reason to.
How a race runs
Stand on the island's start pedestal and hold R for two seconds, a Classic-style channelled start. Step off the pedestal and the channel breaks; step back on and go again. Then a 3 · 2 · 1 · GO! counts you down and the clock starts.
Fly the checkpoints in order. Each is a glowing neon ring with a generous detection radius. The next one burns yellow, passed rings flash green and fade to grey, and rings still to come hang faint cyan in the distance. A chunky green chevron under your bird points the way, and the clock reads to the millisecond.
Two things end a run early. Drop below the course's floor and you are out. Stand on the ground for a cumulative five seconds and you are out, although the counter winds back down while you are airborne, so a brief touch-and-go is forgiven. This is a flying race, and walking is not a line through it. You can also quit deliberately by holding Escape for two seconds or tapping the cancel button on the timer. Abandoning a bad run costs nothing.
Flying a course well
Everything from the flight model matters here, and the Vigor economy matters most. A course flown flat runs you out of charges partway round. A course flown as a chain of shallow dives keeps Thrill of the Skies engaged, and charges come back fast enough to keep surging, so the best line is rarely the shortest one. It is the one that lets you keep trading height for speed and speed for charges.
Because the recharge rate climbs steeply with level, the same course feels different at the gate and at the cap. A circuit you scraped through at level fifteen becomes a place to chase tenths at thirty, which is intended.
Your bird banks into turns and pitches with your aim. That is not decoration. The body attitude tells you what your heading is doing, which matters when the next ring is behind and below you.
Medals and rewards
Each circuit has par times that award medals, and the reward for a run is tied to something more personal: whether you beat your own best.
A first clear pays out. After that, only improvement pays, and how much depends on how hard-won it was. Beat your best by more than a full second and you earn the better prize. Shave off a fraction and you earn the lesser one. Fail to improve and you earn nothing. Rewards scale with the circuit too, with the harder courses paying double and triple, and they go straight into your inventory where nobody else can touch them.
The effect is that a circuit never stops being worth flying and never becomes a slot machine. The only way to be paid again is to genuinely be faster than you were.
Leaderboards
Times persist. Every island carries a floating leaderboard you can fly up to and read, showing the top ten with the current course record holder crowned in Platinum, and the same standings open from the pedestal beside it.
Records belong to the account that set them, so nobody can overwrite your time and your times follow you across devices. One honest caveat: the global board lists verified accounts only. A guest's best time shows on their own view of the board immediately, but joining the permanent standings is one of the concrete reasons to sign in.
Why racing is here at all
The game is an open-world adventure with an unusually deep flight model, which invites a question: once you have mastered flight, what is it for, other than commuting between fights?
Racing is the answer. It is where flight stops being transport and becomes the whole activity: no combat, no loot table, just a line through the air and a clock with no opinion of you. It also gives the long middle of the levelling climb something to chase that is not another pack of creatures, which is exactly where a long game usually loses people.