In VCO’s latest addition to the esports racing world, their sprint-endurance event saw 40 teams tackle 24 races in 24 hours.
Image credit: VCO Esports
In a year of craziness, VCO Esports have been bold enough to bring several events like no other. In January, the first ever Esports Racing World Cup was held which saw teams competing across three separate racing simulation platforms in one event to find the ultimate esports racing team. The next step was to take the concept of round-the-clock endurance racing and flip it on its head.
In the words of lead VCO commentator Arjuna Kankipati, when endurance racing began, it was a challenge of machine versus the clock. As time has passed, cars have evolved and reliability has improved. Endurance races are now sprint races by nature. Now VCO have taken that to heart with the revolutionary Infinity event. 24 races, each 45 minutes in length taking place within 24 hours.
40 teams fielded up to five drivers who would tackle one car and track combination at a time on iRacing. The cars were the Dallara IR18 IndyCar, the Dallara F317 Formula 3 car, the McLaren MP4-12C GT3, the Hyundai Elantra TCR car and the Dallara P217 LMP2 car. All of them would race at Silverstone, Spa-Francorchamps, Monza, Road America and the Daytona Road Course (with the exception of IndyCar at Daytona).
Some of the biggest names in esports racing took part. Redline, Coanda, R8G, Veloce, Rocket, Brabham were just some of the headline names. However, it was also open for amateur teams such as Duck Cat and Wine Racing as well as WAS COOKIN Racing Adventures.
How did the first VCO Infinity go?
In the first few races, Redline were on top. However, they had to contend with Urano Esports, who were taking the fight to them. The iRacing specialist squad won the first race in the IndyCar at Road America. Redline just pipped them to the line at Daytona in the McLaren GT3 cars after winning the second race.
Over the course of the 24 hours, many teams would win races. Coanda ended up winning the most races with eight, and their lead driver Josh Rogers won every one of the five races he entered into. Redline won five, Urano won three and then there were Apex and R8G who won two races apiece.
As for singular race wins, the likes of BS+COMPETITION, SRC Mivano Corse, WAS COOKIN Racing Adventures and Obsidian Racing all did just that. Obsidian earned their win after Coanda’s Paschalis Gkergis incurred a penalty for sending R8G’s Valentin Mandernach upside down in the Daytona F3 race.
Down to the Wire
But approaching the end of the competition, the gap between Redline and Urano was microscopic. Coanda may have had the wins but they couldn’t put together consistent results. As such, they were more or less out of the running.
It looked to be going Urano’s way after Redline suffered a big points loss in Race 17. Patrik Holzmann mounted a kerb in the F3 and damaged the car. But then a less than ideal score for Urano in Race 21 after being penalised for an incident levelled the playing field once more.
The to-ing and fro-ing between the two teams was incredible to behold. Urano were truly contending with one of the biggest simracing organisations there is. Ultimately they only just came up short, finishing three points behind Redline. But, it was still an incredible result. The top 10 placing teams of the 40 that took part take home a share of $5,000.
Will it happen again?
The event has proven popular with drivers and fans alike. 24 hour racing is already a huge challenge for drivers, but this format with its many different cars and many different tracks makes the drivers have to quickly adapt.
There was nearly constant action. In this way, the event was unlike typical endurance racing, where after a few hours when the field is spread.
If you missed any of the action, you can catch up with it all on all three YouTube streams. Races 1-8, Races 9-18 and Races 19-24.
Would you like to see VCO INFINITY return? Tell us on Twitter at @OverTake_gg or in the comments down below!
