Bottas raises Virtual GP entry to eight current F1 drivers

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Eight current Formula 1 drivers will contest this weekend’s Virtual Monaco Grand Prix, a new high for the series.

Valtteri Bottas and Esteban Ocon will join the regular competitors for the sixth round of the series.

Charles Leclerc, Alexander Albon, Lando Norris, Antonio Giovinazzi, George Russell and Nicholas Latifi will also race again this weekend. Carlos Sainz Jnr, who drove in the China round, is the only previous participant who is not racing this weekend.

Two ex-F1 drivers’ sons will also join the race – David Schumacher and Nicolas Prost.

Four of the other places for this weekend’s race will be taken by celebrities and competitors for other sports.

Virtual Monaco Grand Prix entry list

TeamDriverNotes
MercedesValtteri BottasFirst appearance
MercedesEsteban Gutierrez
FerrariCharles Leclerc
FerrariTBC
Red BullAlexander Albon
Red BullKai LennySurfer
McLarenLando Norris
McLarenPierre-Emerick AubameyangFootball player
RenaultEsteban OconFirst appearance
RenaultNicolas Prost
AlphaTauriTBC
AlphaTauriTBC
Raing PointDavid Schumacher
Raing PointLuis FonsiSinger
Alfa RomeoAntonio Giovinazzi
Alfa RomeoThibaut CourtoisFootball player
HaasTBC
HaasTBC
WilliamsGeorge Russell
WilliamsNicholas Latifi

Previous Virtual Grand Prix winners

Virtual Grand PrixTrackWinner
BahrainBahrain International CircuitGuanyu Zhou
VietnamAlbert ParkCharles Leclerc
ChinaShanghai International CircuitCharles Leclerc
NetherlandsInterlagosAlexander Albon
SpainCircuit de CatalunyaGeorge Russell

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    Keith Collantine
    Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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    16 comments on “Bottas raises Virtual GP entry to eight current F1 drivers”

    1. You know, with all this virtual racing talk, I have no idea how to watch it. Have I missed how previously?

      1. Biskit Boy (@sean-p-newmanlive-co-uk)
        21st May 2020, 11:33

        duh!
        Youtube
        Sky F1,
        You were being ironic? duh! my bad

        1. No mate I’m not being ironic. What YouTube channel? What sky feed? I don’t have sky so I have to pay to watch?? Pretty basic questions.

          Simply saying “On YouTube” is pretty vague when their are literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of channels.

          1. @homerlovesbeer It’s on Pewdiepie of course!
            Or if not on there then maybe try the F1 YouTube Channel…

          2. It’s on the Formula 1 channel mate.

      2. Sergey Martyn
        21st May 2020, 16:55

        What a virtual crap… Yawn… Never seen anyhting and never will. Feed this to Wachowsky sisters.

    2. always wanted to watch a virtual GP but never got to it, so I wonder how things are happening: is there commentary available from Crofty and Martin? I bet they too are missing the racing. Also, how are pitstops done, do the racers have engineers and strategists, or do they make their own calls?

      1. Joe Pineapples
        21st May 2020, 11:22

        Never watched one myself, but a bit of light-hearted commentary from those two would help I imagine.

        1. Commentary in the first few races came from BBC F1’s Jack Nicholls and F2’s Alex Jacques. The latter few have seen Alex Jacques joined by someone called Matt Gallagher.

          Both Nicholls and Jacques have shown themselves to be fantastic commentators, I’d rate them better than Croft but not yet on par with the top two lead motorsport commentators Murray Walker and his successor Ben Edwards.

          The racing itself has been pretty fun. I’ve enjoyed it. Analysis comes from Natalie Pinkham and a bloke who I have no idea who it is, guessing he is the eSports presenter.

          1. Matt Gallagher is a youtube streamer for F1 stuff if you watch Youtube for your F1 stuff you will see him.

      2. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
        21st May 2020, 19:35

        The pit stops look so fake though. as soon as the drivers drive into the pit late, it is all automatic and the speed they pull in and out of their box looks so robotic.

        And from watching the highlights on the “official” F1 channel, I struggle to believe just how bad this game looks. I really should accept that it is for lower end systems, but I just wonder why it is officially the F1 game. The official one should be far better than this. The cars look like they are floating half the time, they keep turning into ghosts when they spin – and that reminds me, the amount of drivers that instantly crash into the wall the second they pull away from the starting grid is actually hilarious. I don’t even think a real driver could deliberately do a move that looks as strange as these.

        I mean take a look how one of the renaults jolts in an impossible manner.
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S87ETf6wor4&list=PLfoNZDHitwjU1moRPhV163T1QHTpkui89&index=7&t=486s

        Then vandoorne goes all over the place here. There are both a mix of good and bad drivers, but I don’t think this game reflects the drivers true ability at all.

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MFpM_KE9FE

        Some of this is just too much for me to watch.

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2TCA-NW_fM&t=207s

        All 3 of these starts have some really odd things happening in them.

        1. petebaldwin (@)
          21st May 2020, 20:37

          They are just some of the many things people have begged Codemasters to look at but it doesn’t happen. The janky pitstops have always baffled me – it shouldn’t be difficult to get the cars to drive in and out of the pits naturally and it certainly should be an option to have manual pitstops.

        2. What you are watching is the online feed though. What the drivers are seeing is completely different and much more smooth.
          The stuff we watch is a live feed which is hampered by connectivity issues.

          1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
            22nd May 2020, 12:11

            This doesn’t change the fact that drivers suddenly swing into the most unrealistic looking crashes possible with no damage. The pit stops are nothing but smooth. You can tell by watching it that the issues I’m talking is nothing related to the connection. Drivers instantly crashing into the wall at the start has simply nothing to do with our end. That would be like saying half the crashes actually didn’t happen from the drivers point of view.

    3. He’ll do well, he used to race in Live For Speed.

    4. Still no Juju Noda on the grid?

    Comments are closed.