Sim Racing and Esports News for February 3, 2022 – Porsches, Indycars, Driven by Diversity and More

Some great Sim Racing and Esports News this week including developments with Porsche one make racing, Indycars, SCCA Runoffs, the new Driven by Diversity Cup and more.

• Porsche Esports Carrera Cup GB, the virtual championship for professional sim racers, made a successful debut in 2021 and crowned 21-year-old Esports star Sebastian Job as its inaugural champion. The third Porsche Motorsport GB championship, running alongside Porsche Visit Cayman Islands Sprint Challenge GB and Porsche Carrera Cup GB, returns for 2022 with a full calendar of 16 races taking place across eight weekends.

• Motorsport Games Inc. has announced that, in conjunction with INDYCAR, the 2022 INDYCAR-Motorsport Games Pro Challenge, is to be held on February 9, 2022. The challenge will feature current NTT INDYCAR SERIES drivers, including reigning champion Alex Palou, four-time Indianapolis 500 champion Helio Castroneves and two-time series champion Josef Newgarden. This marks the first official esports event since the parties entered into an exclusive agreement in July of 2021 for Motorsport Games to produce an INDYCAR virtual race series and debut a new INDYCAR game title expected to launch in 2023 on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC.

• iRacing’s sim racing platform regularly hosts Special Events on its calendar, and in 2022 those special events will include the iRacing SCCA Runoffs. Utilizing the Super Session model, drivers will have the opportunity to qualify for the iRacing SCCA Runoffs throughout the week of October 17-21, 2022, before the top qualifiers strap in over the course of a marathon eight-hour broadcast day on Saturday, October 22.

• Motorsport magazine has a great article on Cranfield Simulations motorsport simulator. Check out The F1 racing sim that delivers chest-crushing realism in your living room. “What we try to do is focus less on what the car does and instead focus on what the driver feels”

• If you are questioning the usefulness of simulators for real world motorsport preparation, have a look at Why F1 sims have won over their biggest sceptics on Autosport.

• This is from 2018 so the technology has improved since then but Blayze looks at How Real Is Sim Racing?

• Wondering what the value of sponsorship in esports is? Sport Business looks at the Nielsen and Fnatic study that shows growing value of esports sponsorships.

• Finally, Driven by Diversity is all about creating opportunities for underrepresented groups often overlooked in the motorsport industry. The non-profit organisation raises funds to provide opportunities in many areas of motorsport, helping everyone build towards a more inclusive space. They are now increasing their involvement in sim racing. The non-profit organisation is teaming up with the SimGrid to bring the Driven by Diversity Cup on February 19th – a two hour mini endurance race designed to raise awareness of how sim-racing can be an entry point into the motorsport industry, especially for under-represented groups.

That’s if for this week in sim racing and esports news. See you next week! Stay safe.