The future of F1 Esports series has raised concerns following the postponement of this weekend’s round.
The second LAN event for 2023 in the simulation racing series has been postponed by F1 Esports, the esports arm of the Formula 1 international car racing league.
The F1 sim racing event had originally been scheduled for December 15 and 16. This event comes right after November’s 2023 World Championship Round 1.
The F1 Esports Series Pro Championship, formerly known as the F1 Sim Racing 2023 World Championship, is currently in its seventh year of competition. But since rebranding, it has had a difficult start to its debut season.
In the series, twenty drivers compete on EA’s F1 23 which is the official Formula 1 racing game. All ten Formula 1 teams are officially represented while the cars are configured for equal performance to place the challenge of racing on the competitors’ skills.
A Formula 1 representative declared that the second round this weekend has been postponed due to interruptions to the opening event last month, but they did not specify when it will be held.
“Formula 1 can confirm that event two of the F1 Sim Racing 2023 World Championship has been postponed,” it said in a statement.
“F1 will continue to work with the esports teams and partners and will provide a further update in due course.”
Although Formula 1 and the teams have heavily promoted and marketed previous seasons, this year’s championship opening round in Stockholm, the first live event held in person since the pandemic began, was not made public beforehand.
The opening race on Friday, November 24, which was supposed to be the first of two races was canceled. The following evening the race took place with Alfa Romeo esports driver Thomas Ronhaar winning the season’s first race.
Although the championship’s second round was scheduled for the coming weekend, nothing official has been released regarding the event’s location or the circuits where racing would take place.
Marcel Kiefer, a Williams esports racer and multiple race winner in the simracing series, voiced his discontent with the start of the season in a video that he posted to his YouTube channel.
“What’s going on in the background is pretty devastating to all drivers and team member that work so hard to make all of this happen,” Kiefer said.
“It sucks and I hope it’s going to change very soon, because there was a lot of excitement after round one, from all drivers, all teams.
“They deserve a good championship – the fans deserve a proper championship fight.
“I’m positive that this will get sorted eventually. I do not know when – I think nobody knows.”
Current Alfa Romeo esports driver Brendon Leigh won the first two seasons of the F1 Sim Racing World Championship. Ferrari esports driver David Tonizza took home the title in 2019, before Jarno Opmeer won back-to-back titles for Alfa Romeo and Mercedes esports. Lucas Blakeley, a McLaren Shadow racer, won the series on F1 22 last year.
