For the first time, the H.E.S.S. Prize has been awarded to a team rather than a single person: Fabian, Johannes, Simon, and Tim together formed the “MC validation team”. In a truly tremendous effort, these four scrutinised the HAP simulation pipeline for the FlashCam camera from beginning to end and validated every part of it through detailed comparisons with actual data. They were able to show that, with several adjustments to the simulation settings, a much better agreement between the simulations and the data can be achieved. Furthermore, their work enabled for the first time in the HAP analysis pipeline to properly take into account the atmospheric conditions during the observations through a transparency correction factor. Based on the work of the team, the simulations of the other telescope cameras have also been validated. Since the work was done by the team as a whole, the H.E.S.S. Collaboration Board decided to award the H.E.S.S. Prize to all four members.