Pinto maintains 2023 Porsche Esports Supercup points lead | FOS Future Lab

It was Zac Campbell showing the early pace though, as the Hockenheim feature race winner pipped 2022 TAG Heuer Pole Award man Sebastian Job to pole position by just five-thousandths of a second, with Pinto six-hundredths back in third – and the entire field split by only six-tenths of a second.

The sprint races are often cagey affairs, but some big names fell early on. Maximilian Benecke, after his ESL R1 win last weekend, found himself in the gravel at the Estoril curve, while Jamie Fluke was the main victim from Luca Kita’s missed braking point at the Adelaide hairpin – both on lap one.

Campbell’s solid start was helped by the chasing Job picking up a slow-down penalty after taking too big a bite of the final chicane. Job wisely served this penalty off the racing line, allowing team-mate Cooper Webster – who’d passed Pinto early in the race – to take second, with Job slotting back into fourth behind Pinto.

That would be the only major change of running order among the top eight cars, which also saw Jordan Caruso picking up good points in fifth – behind team-mate Oscar Mangan – as well as Tuomas Tahtela’s first top-eight finish of the season. Charlie Collins claimed eighth, well clear of Alejandro Sanchez, to take the reverse-grid pole position for the feature race.

Round 2, Race 1 results

1 - Zac Campbell (VRS) - 10 laps

2 - Cooper Webster (Red Bull) - +0.474s

3 - Diogo Pinto (Redline) - +1.243s

With twice the points on offer, the feature race didn’t wait around for the action to kick off as Alessandro Bico appeared to be helped off the circuit before he’d even turned for the first corner. That was a mere portent, as Job and Caruso came to blows at Adelaide just fractions of a second before two of the VRS cars – Bryn Collins and race one-winner Zac Campbell – collided. Replays showed Collins was helped into Campbell by Yoann Harth, who also ended up flipping Quentin Vialatte in the melee. Damage from the crash caused the retirement of three of the VRS cars, with Campbell, Bryn Collins, and Bobby Zalenski all heading to the pits, along with Bico and Vialatte.

At the front though it was Charlie Collins leading Tahtela, as the front two avoided all of the mayhem behind, with Job and Pinto in their tyre tracks. However, Collins soon began to drop the Finnish driver, pulling away by almost half a second a lap. With half distance completed, Job made his move on Tahtela at the hairpin to climb up into second. Pinto followed him through on the run up the Nurburgring section. Caruso almost made it three positions lost in two corners but couldn’t make the move stick – but he’d take the spot at the hairpin on the next lap.

Despite being free to chase the leader, Job couldn’t make any inroads – and it was Pinto behind that became the bigger concern. Sure enough on the final lap, Pinto sent his car up the inside of Job at the hairpin to take second, with Caruso nipping through into third at the same time. That would be how they’d finish, with Collins’ advantage stretching to 6.6 seconds as the two champions behind battled each other. Pinto though took the championship lead by just two points as the series heads to Long Beach for round three.

Round 2, Race 2 results

1 - Charlie Collins (VRS) - 20 laps

2 - Diogo Pinto (Redline) - +6.605s

3 - Jordan Caruso (Altus) - +7.082s

The 2023 eNASCAR season is underway, with a grandstand finish to the first round at Daytona seeing a new name taking a race win.

Debutant Tucker Minter came out on top in a chaotic race bookended by incidents. It took just 11 seconds for the first caution of the race, as the midfield runners tripped over each other, and that would be the theme for the evening.

In fact, the race went on for 87 laps rather than the scheduled 80, as a collision in overtime brought another overtime period.

Defending champion Casey Kirwan looked to have the win in the bag, but right at the finish Minter went low and the cars collided as Kirwan went to block. Minter held on to win, with Kirwan fourth.

Round 1 results

1 - Tucker Minter (Team Dillon eSports) - 87 laps

2 - Malik Ray (Jim Beaver eSports) - +0.056s

3 - Darik Bourdeau (Elliott Sadler eSports) - +0.201s

SRO Esports has announced its 2023 calendar, and it has expanded once again to offer a new series of live events.

The SRO Esport Sim Pro Series will run at five rounds of the GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Series, and see 24 invited sim racers battle in the same Fanatec Arena used by the pro drivers for the Fanatec GT Esports Pro series.

All four of the online championships will also return, with five races each in the three regional sprint race series – Americas, Asia, and Europe – and the intercontinental GT Challenge endurance event for teams.