Zac Campbell kicked off the chase towards the 2023 Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup championship with a win in the feature race from Hockenheimring Baden-Wurttemberg, passing Lasse Bak on Lap 4 and leading the balance of the race to return to the top step of the podium. Campbell’s VRS Coanda Simsport teammate Charlie Collins made it a 1-2 for the team, while Williams Esports’ Alessandro Bico completed the podium.
The fifth season of iRacing’s collaboration with Porsche to feature the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup in top-tier sim racing kicked off with another pair of exciting All-Star races, featuring real-world pros and popular content creators. Fresh off winning the eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series Clash at the Coliseum earlier in the week, Casey Kirwan kicked off the festivities by beating IndyCar legend Tony Kanaan and Borja Zazo in the sprint race, but it was Jardier who took the top spot after the grid was inverted for the feature. Jardier slipped past Basic Ollie and 2021 champion Emree after they made contact in the hairpin on the last lap, although the duo maintained podium places ahead of Kirwan in fourth.
As the chase for a $200,000 series purse kicked off for the pro drivers, Altus Esports driver Jordan Caruso posted the top qualifying time, outqualifying defending champion Diogo Pinto of Team Redline and looking to add his name to the list of front-runners for this season. But Collins, and then Pinto, would get past and eventually take the lead, with Pinto kicking off his title defense as the sprint race winner, grabbing the early points but settling for eighth on the starting grid for the feature as part of the series’ eight-car invert.
That invert gave Lasse Bak the feature pole, and the Danish rookie would hang on up front of the first three laps before Campbell finally got by. The American would lead the final 15 laps to match his car number and score his first feature win since last April at Spa. Behind Collins and Bico, Caruso and Pinto would complete the top five, while a hard-charging Yohann Harth jumped 10 spots on the grid to finish sixth ahead of Bak, veterans Maximilian Benecke and Jamie Fluke, and rookie Gustavo Ariel.
Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup feature results from Hockenheimring were as follows:
Fin. | St. | No. | Name | Laps | Interval | Led | Best | Pts |
| 1 | 3 | 15 | Zac Campbell | 18 | 0.000 | 15 | 1:39.779 | 65 |
| 2 | 7 | 93 | Charlie Collins | 18 | -0.514 | 0 | 1:39.596 | 67 |
| 3 | 2 | 77 | Alessandro Bico | 18 | -1.268 | 0 | 1:39.776 | 54 |
| 4 | 6 | 12 | Jordan Caruso | 18 | -1.724 | 0 | 1:39.642 | 57 |
| 5 | 8 | 1 | Diogo C. Pinto | 18 | -4.139 | 0 | 1:39.659 | 59 |
| 6 | 16 | 90 | Yohann Harth | 18 | -4.459 | 0 | 1:39.576 | 36 |
| 7 | 1 | 24 | Lasse Bak | 18 | -5.062 | 3 | 1:39.613 | 41 |
| 8 | 12 | 11 | Maximilian Benecke | 18 | -5.217 | 0 | 1:39.606 | 35 |
| 9 | 10 | 49 | Jamie Fluke | 18 | -6.442 | 0 | 1:40.048 | 35 |
| 10 | 13 | 21 | Gustavo Ariel | 18 | -6.832 | 0 | 1:39.746 | 30 |
| 11 | 15 | 40 | Julien Soenen | 18 | -9.864 | 0 | 1:39.631 | 26 |
| 12 | 18 | 16 | Luca Kita | 18 | -10.231 | 0 | 1:39.490 | 21 |
| 13 | 22 | 99 | Oscar Mangan | 18 | -10.245 | 0 | 1:39.672 | 16 |
| 14 | 23 | 10 | Christopher Dambietz | 18 | -12.161 | 0 | 1:39.878 | 14 |
| 15 | 11 | 69 | Moreno Sirica | 18 | -13.291 | 0 | 1:39.842 | 22 |
| 16 | 30 | 70 | Gianni Vecchio | 18 | -14.392 | 0 | 1:39.628 | 10 |
| 17 | 27 | 3 | Kevin Nielsen | 18 | -14.655 | 0 | 1:39.742 | 9 |
| 18 | 25 | 92 | Mathias Stokbæk Jensen | 18 | -17.544 | 0 | 1:39.927 | 8 |
| 19 | 17 | 37 | Cooper Webster | 18 | -18.628 | 0 | 1:39.897 | 11 |
| 20 | 4 | 22 | Sebastian Job | 18 | -19.050 | 0 | 1:39.378 | 22 |
| 21 | 28 | 33 | Alexey Nesov | 18 | -21.373 | 0 | 1:39.702 | 5 |
| 22 | 5 | 47 | Alejandro Sánchez | 18 | -22.274 | 0 | 1:40.042 | 22 |
| 23 | 26 | 97 | Tuomas Tähtelä | 18 | -22.549 | 0 | 1:39.399 | 3 |
| 24 | 24 | 81 | Quentiin Vialatte | 18 | -23.212 | 0 | 1:39.642 | 2 |
| 25 | 21 | 46 | Bryn Collins | 18 | -27.364 | 0 | 1:40.141 | 1 |
| 26 | 29 | 28 | Sam Kuitert | 18 | -27.480 | 0 | 1:40.150 | 0 |
| 27 | 19 | 27 | Simone Maria Marcenò | 18 | -1:01.117 | 0 | 1:39.903 | 2 |
| 28 | 14 | 83 | Bobby Zalenski | 17 | -1L | 0 | 1:41.603 | 7 |
| 29 | 9 | 4 | Salva Talens | 13 | -5L | 0 | 1:39.680 | 12 |
| 30 | 20 | 5 | Oskari Rinne | 1 | -17L | 0 | ——— | 1 |
Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup points through one round are as follows:
- Charlie Collins, 73
- Jordan Caruso, 67
- Diogo Pinto, 67
- Zac Campbell, 65
- Alessandro Bico, 54
- Lasse Bak, 41
- Yohann Harth, 36
- Maximilian Benecke, 35
- Jamie Fluke, 35
- Gustavo Ariel, 30
The 2023 Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup season rolls on in two weeks with a debut engagement at Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours, which made its iRacing debut last year. Coverage will kick off on Saturday, February 18 at 18:00 GMT (1PM ET) with the All-Star action, before the pros do battle at 19:00 GMT (2PM ET).
For more information on the 2023 Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup season, visit www.iracing.com/pesc. For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit www.iracing.com.
Images via Porsche Motorsport
