Does training on a video game actually help you in racing?

I've got a race at Barber Motorsports park in Birmingam, AL this weekend. As someone at work called it "LA" for "Lower Alabama". I have been there a few times for Grand Am races to spectate, but never driven the track. With the wear and tear implications,the fact thats its already a 3 race weekend (I'm running a SARRC Race Sat and Sunday, and Dan, the previous car owner, is driving in the Saturday ProIT), and the fact that I wanted to do this little experiment, I'm not running the test day on Friday. That means my first view/action on this track will be qualifying on Saturday morning for the SARRC race.

I'm usually pretty good at getting up to speed because of my autox experience, so I'm not TOO worried about this. Just in case though, I've spent quite a few hours behind the wheel of a couple of PC Racing Sims on the track. The two sims I've been playing are Race07 and rFactor. They are both fairly realistic and with my wheel/pedal setup, feel great. Also, compared to a few real videos of the track, I think they have the layout and corners fairly nailed. I've been driving a Mini Cooper in Race07, as its the closest thing to my Integra, and a VW Rabbit in rFactor.

I've probably got about 2 hours or so of video game track time now and plan to spend another hour or so over the next couple of days. We'll see how close the game is to real life and if things like brake points and landmarks are close enough so I can qualify near the pointy end of the field!

I also posted on the roadraceautox.com forum to see what others thought