I dl'd the demo over christmas 2003. No registration needed, just run the game, pick a name and off you went in the xfg, xrg or xrt. I remember being impressed by the graphics and smoothness for a demo. Setting the car up was easy. Max tyre pressures, full stiffness on the springs and dampers, lowest ride height and maximum track width.
On my first night, someone said in game chat to me, "the force is strong in this one", which was encouraging, so I stuck around, until the rFactor demo came out a few months later and we all went over there for a while. LFS felt a better driving experience than rFactor, so I bought LFS.