This year’s opening weekend of the Asetek Simsport Community Trophy, part of the ADAC Sim Racing Expo staple of competitions this year, saw 40 drivers, who qualified via Grid Finder’s Hot Lap Challenge, hit the track for the first of five rounds of competition.
For those new to the format, the top 40 drivers were split into two groups of 20 drivers based on their qualifying positions, with the top 10 drivers from each group going into the points final.
One of the pundit’s favourites for this year’s competition, Igor WÄ…sowski, had a strong qualifying session taking pole position around Norisring (on Assetto Corsa) with a time of 48.085 seconds with a gap of 0.011 seconds to Leonardo Passoni.
Wąsowski headed the field through the first lap of group race one, challenged by Passoni with Thomas Cope going toe-to-toe with Rafał Szołtysek. Msrs Wasowski, Passoni and Cope topped the podium for the group one race and were joined by the remainder of the competitors who finished in the top 10 of the first race.
Meanwhile, seasoned professional Leon Harhoff set the standings alight in group race two for the first round of the Asetek Simsport Community Trophy. With tough competition from a field including some of the other top qualifiers from the leaderboard, Leon set their stall out early qualifying on pole and taking the win in the second race of the evening.
At the end of the inaugural event, the top 10 drivers from both races moved into the points final. 20 drivers on the grid, and the finest of margins in qualifying meant that it was all to play for into the first major braking zone of lap one at the German venue.
Clean enough, with plenty of cold tyres locking the first time around, Harhoff proved a dominant force for the rest of the field, finishing the race with around 7 seconds to spare in front of group race one winner WÄ…sowski. Battles raged around the mid-pack with drivers going three or four wide into each of the major hairpins at Norisring and after 25 laps, the points were paid out.
Drivers will now prepare for the second round on 11th August at the Nürburgring Sprint layout with live coverage on the ADAC SimRacing Expo YouTube channel. Standings after the first round can be viewed within the Grid Finder Championship