Diogo Pinto's Porsche Esports Supercup title defence starts with a win | FOS Future Lab

Hockenheim staged the season opener, and sprang a surprise as Jordan Caruso – better known for his V8 Supercars Esports exploits – took the first pole position and first point of the season, by a relatively comfortable 0.15 seconds from the 2022 champion.

A messy start saw the midfield tripping over one another, with Contender Series champion Tuomas Tahtela unlucky to be taken out, and creating a second’s gap to the front nine cars. Caruso then saw his early lead evaporate as he out-braked himself at the hairpin, allowing Pinto and Collins to drive past and take up the battle for first.

Their fight soon brought 2020 champion Sebastian Job into the mix, but Pinto soon hit the front again. Job found himself on the outside of a three-wide hairpin, as both Caruso and Alejandro Sanchez came back through, allowing the front two to draw clear with Pinto holding a small advantage over Collins in second.

That seemed to be the catalyst for the racing to calm down somewhat, with the front eight – significant due to the top-eight reverse grid feature race – now comfortable in their positions. Pinto would take the chequered flag first to take the sprint race win and match his tally for the whole of his championship season, with Collins second and Caruso on the podium for the first time

Having finished the sprint race in eighth it was debutant Lasse Bak starting the feature race from pole position, with Alessandro Bico alongside. Job though made the best start, beating Zak Campbell into third.

Sanchez had made the worst start of the front eight, and that had an unfortunate outcome. Braking for the hairpin Sanchez was tagged from behind by Williams driver Moreno Sirica, and that saw him collect his own team-mate Salva Talens in the process. With carnage that followed, the front seven cars now had some clear air behind.

With two laps gone already, Job made a play for the lead. Bico left the door slightly ajar at the hairpin, and Job kicked it wide open with a little contact. However as he tried to pass Bak through the stadium he found himself on the outside track; Bico came back through and Job had nowhere to go but grass – falling back to 14th.

The scrapping gave Campbell the chance to hit the front, and he slipped through at the start of lap four to take a lead he’d never relinquish. Campbell’s advantage was helped by Bico and Bak fighting for second, which Bico would take on lap nine with Collins following through just one corner later to get himself onto the podium.

Collins would make that a second successive second place through the hairpin with five laps remaining to make a Coanda 1-2 at the front. He’d hold onto that as Bico focused on holding off Caruso behind.

The two second-place finishes give Collins the early championship lead, with Pinto and Caruso tied for second, six points further back. Magny-Cours will host the next races on February 18.

Race 1

1 - Diogo Pinto (Team Redline) - 9 laps

2 - Charlie Collins (VRS Coanda) - +0.382s

3 - Jordan Caruso (Altus Esports) - +2.043s

Race 2

1 - Zac Campbell (VRS Coanda) - 18 laps

2 - Charlie Collins (VRS Coanda) - +0.518s

3 - Alessandro Bico (Williams) - +1.267s

Another defending champion getting their season off with a win is eNASCAR’s 2022 winner Casey Kirwan. Kirwan took the win – although no championship points – in the exhibition “Clash at the Coliseum” series opener, just as he did on his charge to his first title last season.

Although the champion didn’t win his heat in the non-championship event at the quarter-mile LA Coliseum – finishing third behind Bobby Zalenski and Timmy Holmes – he’d hit the front with 32 laps to go in the finale to lay down an early marker with the season just two weeks away.

Final

1 - Casey Kirwan (XSET) - Chevrolet - 70 laps

2 - Garrett Lowe (Jim Beaver) - Ford - +1.117s

3 - Parker White (Kanaan Esports) - Toyota - +3.391s

If you want to take part in the 2023 F1 Esports series, and be in with a chance of winning part of the $750,000 prize fund, qualification starts this week on all platforms.

As with previous seasons, there’ll be two qualifying “scenarios” available to players of the F1 22 title on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox. The first is open now, and sees you recreating the final laps of the 2022 British Grand Prix as Lando Norris in the McLaren MCL36. 

You’ll need to finish the race as high as possible, climbing from Norris’s real finishing position of sixth to at least fourth, in the shortest time possible. When this challenge ends at 2359 UTC on February 14, a new one will replace it running through to the end of February 28.

The top finishers in each will be invited onto the Challengers Series, with one series for each of the three platforms. After that the top drivers – the top six in previous years will be in with a chance of being signed by one of the ten F1 teams in the 2023 Draft for the main championship.