With the imminent return of F1 Esports, we managed to catch up with a couple of the drivers.
Brendon Leigh, two-time F1 Esports World Champion, and James Baldwin, World’s fastest Gamer, discussed various elements of the coming season.
One change for the 2020 season is longer race distances, but what do the drivers make of these changes?
The Rules Change
The F1 2020 Esports Championship will feature races at 35% of their regular length, as opposed to the previous 25%.
Not only does this mean longer races, it also means more coverage for the drivers, and for spectators.
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This is likely to affect several elements of the tight-knit racing, including tyre strategy, ERS Deployment strategies and more!
This 35% race distance is on a special build of F1 2020 made specifically by Codemasters for the F1 Esports 2020 Championship!
So what did the two British drivers have to say about the upcoming change?
"A good thing"
Brendon Leigh was excited by the change, stating that “the longer races are a good thing”.
He went on to mention that this is for both the driver and the spectator.
The drivers get to spend longer in the sim, and the spectators have more racing to watch.
Whilst he avoided talking about how the longer distance may affect in-race strategies, we are sure these will be revealed once racing starts this week.
Leigh also mentioned that the possibility for track extension penalties will increase with longer races, and we’re excited to see how this plays out.
Strategy comes into play
Similarly, James Baldwin hailed the decision to implement longer races as a good one.
The change was not claimed to be “drastically different” by James, who went on to say that it is important to be more consistent.
The McLaren Shadow driver also said that “strategy is more of a factor”, with potential for two strategies to be identical on certain tracks.
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He did say that the longer races could prove to be a nightmare for drivers, stating that “it’s more of a risk”, but we’re sure that this will lead to close racing on the track.
How to watch
The F1 Esports Series returns this week!
Watch Event 1 of the F1 Esports Pro Series presented by Aramco on 14-15 October live on F1’s official Facebook, YouTube and Twitch channels. For full info on how to watch visit https://www.f1esports.com/
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