© @bcampbell_photoTough Round For Bulls In Le Mans Virtual seriesSpa-Francorchamps sees the Red Bull Racing Esports teams finish P8 and P14.
Round2oftheLeMansVirtualseriesprovedtobetoughoutingfortheBulls.
A driver swap issue and an unavoidable collision hindered the team after a positive start at Spa-Fracorchamps.
Dennis Lind narrowly escaped a crash at the start of the race and battled hard to move up the grid. However, a delayed driver swap left Dennis having to complete a further lap with minimal fuel, leaving the team two laps behind the race lead.
From there, it was always going to to be a difficult race, however, the team had prepared for wet weather and felt that they could claw back some places once the rain fell.
Taking On The Iconic Spa-Francorchamps Circuit© @bcampbell_photo
Red Bull Racing Esports’ Alex Siebel, team newcomer and Formula 3 pro Jack Doohan and Danish pro racer Dennis Lind kept pushing in difficult circumstances, hoping their strategy would pay off.
However, the rain never came, capping off an unlucky event for the Bulls and leaving them in P14 after a six hour stint in Belgium.
Alex Siebel said: “The first stint was promising after Dennis just about escaped a start crash. But in the end, it didn't matter as a driver swap failure did put us back two laps. After that we hoped for a lot of rain but even though the chance was around 90%, the rain didn't come. Sadly, it was a day to forget for us.
“Besides nailing the strategy in case of rain, our biggest challenge was to stay within the track limits to prevent a drive-through penalty. One of the positives to take from our performance was that Dennis, Jack and myself have kept it clean in that regard.
“The possibility of rain had a big impact on us. We compromised the setup a bit since driving the LMP2 in the rain is difficult, especially through Eau Rouge and Blanchimont. That way, we also wanted to save time in the pits since we wouldn't have needed to change the car setup in case of rain. With the rain staying absent it didn't pay off obviously.
“The start of this season has been far from optimal but it doesn't change the plan for us. We made decent progress in pace from the season opener to Saturday, so the goal is to keep that up, give 100% at every race and eventually we force the luck to be on our side for the remaining rounds!”
Focusing On The Race Strategy At Spa© @bcampbell_photo
An early collision put a dampener on proceedings after a positive start for the Bulls in the GTE category.
Formula 3 driver Jonny Edgar made his debut for Red Bull Racing Esports and started the race well, moving from P9 to fifth place in the first lap.
Around 30 minutes into the race an LMP2 spun in front of Jonny, leading to a collision that caused serious damage to the Corvette C8.R.
The resulting repairs left Nestor Garcia, Jonny Edgar and Yuri Kasdorp 3 minutes off the pace of the race leaders.
As with the LMP2 drivers, the GTE team hoped that they would be able to gain some places in the rain but unfortunately it wasn’t to be, and the team finished in P8.
Nailing The Apex In GTE© @bcampbell_photo
Red Bull Racing Esports driver Yuri said: “The balance of performance did not change in our car, which meant we lacked some pace but we were confident we could still fight for a good position being well prepared for the rain. We let Jonny start to avoid having him drive the rain and he did a mega job! He was fuel saving very well keeping with the cars not fuel saving in the top 10 but unfortunately an LMP2 crashed straight ahead of him that he couldn't avoid. That meant that the race for top 5 was over 30 min into the race. After that we were waiting for rain that never came but managed to finish ahead of everyone else that had issues in P8.”
Dennis Jordan said: “Going in, making the best of the wet weather was key. It meant that fuel saving in the opening stints was paramount to lengthen stints enough to avoid getting caught out by rain arriving just after you had done one of your stops as much as possible. Obviously with how our race went, it really was just about finding some kind of hail Mary to get back in contention - unfortunately none presented itself.
“Even though rain never actually arrived, it impacted the preparation and strategy planning a lot. I think it is fair to say that we did adjust our car setups to some extent to be ready for the rain's arrival, so for us it is a bigger shame it did not come for sure.
“On one hand we have had a bad start and seriously need to turn things around. However, one of the key takeaways from Saturday is that our pace, both for us in the LMP2 as well as in the GTE, has severely improved since Monza and we feel like we can now run towards the front if things come together.”
Weather Was Key In Spa-Francorchamps© @bcampbell_photo
This new championship, created by Motorsport Games Inc. uses the rFactor2 platform and consists of five races starting in September and running until January 2022. The first four rounds will be held strictly online, with the final round – 24 Hours of Le Mans Virtual – being a live televised event within the 2022 Autosport International motorsport show in Birmingham, UK on 15-16 January 2022.
With the first two rounds in Monza and Spa now completed, the racing heads to Nürburgring on 13 November, Sebring on 18 December and then the live finale on 15/16 January at Le Mans.
For the series there is a $250,000 prize fund with the team winning the final race of the series collecting half of that fund, so the Red Bull Racing Esports drivers will be fully focused on being crowned champions!
You can follow all the action on the series’ YouTube and Twitch channels.
Stay Tuned To The Le Mans Virtual Series© Le Mans Virtual Series
