Wednesday, 10 April 2024

This week the 2023/24 F1 Sim Racing World Championship continued in Sweden. Debrief with our McLaren Shadow drivers Lucas Blakeley and Wilson Hughes, and Team Manager, Joel Chapman, after Round 2 and 3.

Critical info

Round	2 and 3
Driver Pairing	Lucas Blakeley and Wilson Hughes
Circuit	Jeddah Corniche Circuit and Red Bull Ring

You can catch up on all the action via the LiveStream.

Round 2 - Jeddah Corniche Circuit

Qualified	5th
Finished	4th

Round 3 – Red Bull Ring

Qualified	10th
Finished	14th

“First race day of Event 2 is complete. We had the two Qualifying sessions up first, securing P5 and P10. Our final laps of both Qualifying rounds were tricky, but we were still in a good position heading into both races. We felt there was a little bit more performance left in there, but it was great to make it to Q3 and have Wilson with me for one of them, a real positive from a team perspective.

“The first race was a very positive one for the team. We lost out in the last lap, it’s always a coin flip with those battles, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. P4 was an excellent way to kick off the day. Going into Austria, we managed to get up to P8, however I experienced a game crash when pitting on Lap 13, and it was ultimately race over from there. I tried everything I could to maintain the pace and help Wilson, but it’s a shame as we were due some good points.

“We know what we’ve got to do over the next two days. We know we’re quick enough, and we’ll come back from a disappointing end to an otherwise positive day.”

Round 2 - Jeddah Corniche Circuit

Qualified	9th
Finished	6th

Round 3 – Red Bull Ring

Qualified	11th
Finished	8th

“It's been an eventful day with two Qualifying sessions and two races. Qualifying went well for us, getting into Q3 for Jeddah and then missing out on Q3 by one thousandth for Austria. I was super happy with the first race, finishing P6 and securing my first points in F1 Sim Racing. The engineers absolutely smashed the strategy, so a big thank you to them for their work. 

“Going into the second race of the day, we were feeling positive. It was a tricky race but we were in a good position before Lucas’ game crashed. I was still able to score a few points. We now look ahead to the next two days and I’m looking forward to racing again.”

Joel Chapman, Team Manager, McLaren Racing, said:

“Lots of highs and lows from the first day of racing at Event 2. We came back off a tricky Bahrain, so it was fantastic to have picked up points and move up in the Teams Championship.

“We qualified well in Jeddah which translated into a very strong race for both Lucas and Wilson, with Wilson picking up his first-ever points in F1 Sim Racing, something which we’re very proud of. Lucas was close to a podium finish, but as with the nature of racing, it didn’t quite work out, but we can come away from it with many positives, including the excellent strategy calls made by our engineers.

“During the race at the Red Bull Ring, we were on for another solid points haul, however, Lucas experienced a game crash as he was about to pit, effectively ending his race. Whilst this is incredibly unfortunate and frustrating, it’s uncontrollable and software issues happen in all types of racing. We’ll investigate with the tournament organisers to identify what happened and work with them to ensure it doesn't happen again. Wilson came away from the race with more good points, having worked his way up the field and capitalising on the nature of the race.

“We've got another two busy days ahead, so we'll bounce back as a team and hope to score points in the races to come.”