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| Image courtesy of www.gran-turismo.com |
The first I ever heard of Igor Fraga was when he participated in the inaugural F1 Esports, where he qualified for the final and went to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in order to compete. Unfortunately, he didn't do that well but it showed the crossover was becoming ever closer, as Fraga only ever got involved with the event as a result of having to learn the Mexican Grand Prix track for an upcoming F4 race. Little did he suspect I reckon, where that would lead for him.
Fraga would go on to compete in the FIA Certified Online world championships, which took place on the new Gran Turismo Sport game. Having qualified, Fraga would start turning some heads as he came out on top in the Americas final thus becoming Americas regional champion, and be allowed to compete in the world finals in Monaco last November.
Firstly, he was paired up with his European and Asia-Pacific counterparts Mikail Hizal of Germany and Ryoto Kokubun of Japan as they had all signed in-game with Nissan and thus were Nissan's drivers in the manufacturers final, which didn't go their way unfortunately. But when it came to the nation's final, the individuals championship, Fraga was a man on a mission.
Having won the first race in road cars, he'd come close to winning race two which took place in GT3-style racing cars but would make a mess of it near the end and lost a few places. He had even more of a disaster in the third race which took place in Le Mans style prototype cars, making major errors and thus finishing 11th which meant he would be starting there for the final race.
All hope seemed lost for the Brazilian, but they were now using one of Fraga's favourite cars, the Red Bull X2014 Standard around the full Le Mans Sarthe circuit, and a race I saw and immediately beforehand called it even with as hopeless as it seemed for young Igor. He put in the drive of a lifetime and was in a championship winning position even before overtaking his team mate from the day before and now championship rival Mikail Hizal.
Fraga was taking certain corners at speeds on the least grippiest tyres faster than those on the best tyres, he was defying the virtual physics of Gran Turismo, and yes before you berate me for continuing to deprive you of the answer, yes he did win the race and thus became FIA Certified Online Gran Turismo world champion! Igor Fraga couldn't possibly do better than that could he? Oh yes he can.
Literally a couple of months after wrapping up the Gran Turismo championship, Fraga went on to compete in the McLaren Shadow project final. A test which put a bunch of aspiring Esports racers through their paces, demonstrating physical and psychological evaluation and then also proving their worth on a vast variety of different racing games in order to win a place on McLaren's Esports team.
This included driving IndyCar 2018 on iRacing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the McLaren P1 GTR on Forza Motorsport at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, hotlapping on a mobile tablet at Hockenheim in a McLaren 720S on Real Racing 3, again using the 720S but on Project CARS 2 at Circuit of the Americas equipped with a virtual reality headset, rFactor 2 in 720S GT3 cars around Silverstone and the grand final would be the final three again on rFactor 2 in the 720S GT3 cars around Sebring.
Throughout the final's races, all of Fraga's competitors proved where their strengths laid with some being great at some games and some just not being able to adapt to others, yet Igor continued to finish there or there abouts on every game and rarely was ever outside the top three, incredible consistency. He went into the final race at Sebring the outright favourite and guess what? He didn't disappoint, and won the event with incredible ease and earned a place on McLaren's Esports team.
Now what does this prove in terms of the power of Esports exactly? Well I'll tell you. Before Esports came along, Fraga didn't have a hope in hell in finding a budget or sponsors to race in Europe, but as a direct result of his success on Gran Turismo and earning his place on the McLaren Shadow team, it was announced a couple of days ago that Igor Fraga would be racing in a single seater series in Europe.
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| Image courtesy of www.formulascout.com |
The crossover between real world and virtual driving is closing ever more. We've seen drivers start out on video games, such as GT Academy winner Jann Mardenborough, we have also had events where real world drivers cross over into virtual driving such as the Las Vegas eRace where Formula E drivers raced sim racers which saw now McLaren Esports driver Bono Huis fend off the advances of then Formula E racer Felix Rosenqvist.
McLaren are no strangers to the whole Esports scene, having held another competition in 2017 called World's Fastest Gamer which saw drivers being tested in a similar way to the Shadow Project and the winner was kitchen sales manager Rudy van Buren, who became their official simulator test and development driver. Having won karting championships in his local Netherlands but having to give it up since he couldn't string together a budget and sponsorship to continue his career.
The incredible Race of Champions event opened up its doors for gamers to potentially race real drivers in 2018 with its eRace of Champions with the winner joining WFG winner van Buren in driving real cars against established racing champions. Rudy van Buren even managed to beat McLaren's current driver Lando Norris in one of the heats.
He was joined by now McLaren Esports driver Enzo Bonito, who would go on to compete also a year later and beat established racing champions such as 2012 IndyCar champion Ryan Hunter-Reay, and 2016-17 FIA Formula E champion Lucas di Grassi.
Going back to seeing real world drivers taking virtual racing seriously, Lando Norris and Red Bull F1 driver Max Verstappen have been competing in a few one off endurance races on platforms such as iRacing and rFactor, even being co-drivers in the iRacing Bathurst 12 hours. Although that race was rather ill-fated, the exposure that resulted from their presence made people start to take notice.
We even are starting to see drivers sign themselves to Esports racing teams, such as Norris and Verstappen being affiliated with Team Redline, and Fernando Alonso forming his own Esports team and signing eWTCC champion Alexander Dornieden, McLaren Shadow project finalists Xiang Gao and Ebrahim Al Mubarak and even a real world driver, British GT4 and MRF Challenge champion Jamie Chadwick.
Now every racing championship it seems is adopting their own official Esports championships, and it's no surprise to see why. With how expensive motorsport is becoming, now is the time for Esports to be recognised as a legitimate means for drivers to keep sharp and hone their craft, because with the exception of the heavy physical and G-Force elements of the real world driving, the skills required for real world driving are pretty much there for the virtual racing.
Obviously it differs with every game, I can't imagine the next F1 champion or 24 hours of Le Mans winner will begin their career as a result of being amazing on Mario Kart but I suppose you all have to start somewhere!
But jokes aside, this is what Igor Fraga has proved. Esports can provide you a major platform in car racing, since the skills required are the same, and buying a nice TV, steering wheel, frame and chair is going to be considerably less expensive than a season in a karting championship with all the tools and equipment needed, now is the time for Esports to be taken seriously in a motorsport and car racing context.
Virtual racing could potentially become a new grassroots of motorsport, for drivers looking to appeal for sponsorship. Igor Fraga has proved through his success as Gran Turismo world champion and the winner of the McLaren Shadow project final that it's possible that you can use video gaming and virtual driving as a means to get into real life car racing.
One day, we will have a world champion in F1 and an overall winner at the Le Mans 24 hours who will have had their career happen as a result of planting their ass on a sofa and playing a video game. Car racing is the only sport I reckon where the virtual version works as well as the real version. I can't say that about football, because you aren't moving your legs in order to kick the ball and pass it, you're controlling the other players.
I unfortunately cannot say the same thing about motorcycle racing either, since that involves a way lot more direct body movement and when I saw the MotoGP Esports, the players were using controllers and were literally throwing their bikes into corners because they wouldn't have to worry about what the laws of physics would do to their bodies and thus were going multiple seconds faster than the real world riders could manage.
Car racing in real life and in the virtual world, are very close to each other and because of the lesser amount of expenses involved, it's becoming a serious option for drivers to consider a real world driving career.
Hope you all enjoyed my article. If you did and want to stick around for more articles, either follow me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat or if you're on desktop, go to the 'Follow By Email' option on the right hand of screen and put your email in there, which will then mean that all blog posts I publish will be sent straight to your inbox.
So until we meet again,
L.
He was joined by now McLaren Esports driver Enzo Bonito, who would go on to compete also a year later and beat established racing champions such as 2012 IndyCar champion Ryan Hunter-Reay, and 2016-17 FIA Formula E champion Lucas di Grassi.
Going back to seeing real world drivers taking virtual racing seriously, Lando Norris and Red Bull F1 driver Max Verstappen have been competing in a few one off endurance races on platforms such as iRacing and rFactor, even being co-drivers in the iRacing Bathurst 12 hours. Although that race was rather ill-fated, the exposure that resulted from their presence made people start to take notice.
We even are starting to see drivers sign themselves to Esports racing teams, such as Norris and Verstappen being affiliated with Team Redline, and Fernando Alonso forming his own Esports team and signing eWTCC champion Alexander Dornieden, McLaren Shadow project finalists Xiang Gao and Ebrahim Al Mubarak and even a real world driver, British GT4 and MRF Challenge champion Jamie Chadwick.
Now every racing championship it seems is adopting their own official Esports championships, and it's no surprise to see why. With how expensive motorsport is becoming, now is the time for Esports to be recognised as a legitimate means for drivers to keep sharp and hone their craft, because with the exception of the heavy physical and G-Force elements of the real world driving, the skills required for real world driving are pretty much there for the virtual racing.
Obviously it differs with every game, I can't imagine the next F1 champion or 24 hours of Le Mans winner will begin their career as a result of being amazing on Mario Kart but I suppose you all have to start somewhere!
But jokes aside, this is what Igor Fraga has proved. Esports can provide you a major platform in car racing, since the skills required are the same, and buying a nice TV, steering wheel, frame and chair is going to be considerably less expensive than a season in a karting championship with all the tools and equipment needed, now is the time for Esports to be taken seriously in a motorsport and car racing context.
Virtual racing could potentially become a new grassroots of motorsport, for drivers looking to appeal for sponsorship. Igor Fraga has proved through his success as Gran Turismo world champion and the winner of the McLaren Shadow project final that it's possible that you can use video gaming and virtual driving as a means to get into real life car racing.
One day, we will have a world champion in F1 and an overall winner at the Le Mans 24 hours who will have had their career happen as a result of planting their ass on a sofa and playing a video game. Car racing is the only sport I reckon where the virtual version works as well as the real version. I can't say that about football, because you aren't moving your legs in order to kick the ball and pass it, you're controlling the other players.
I unfortunately cannot say the same thing about motorcycle racing either, since that involves a way lot more direct body movement and when I saw the MotoGP Esports, the players were using controllers and were literally throwing their bikes into corners because they wouldn't have to worry about what the laws of physics would do to their bodies and thus were going multiple seconds faster than the real world riders could manage.
Car racing in real life and in the virtual world, are very close to each other and because of the lesser amount of expenses involved, it's becoming a serious option for drivers to consider a real world driving career.
Hope you all enjoyed my article. If you did and want to stick around for more articles, either follow me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat or if you're on desktop, go to the 'Follow By Email' option on the right hand of screen and put your email in there, which will then mean that all blog posts I publish will be sent straight to your inbox.
So until we meet again,
L.
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