For the second year running, London’s ExCeL Centre would play host to the Grand Finals of Formula E Accelerate, utilising rFactor 2. With a mini-season to traverse instead of simply hot lapping your way to a LAN event, the narrative was perfectly staged. Would Rasmussen be able to deny two-times winner Marcel Csincsik and claim his third consecutive title in the process?
Well, no. In the most disappointing way as well.
The Gamers8 event out in Saudi Arabia was offering eye-watering prizes, so both contestants had been lured away from Formula E. On the one hand, our story had arrived to a halt. On the other hand, it had blown the championship wide open.
There was guaranteed to be a new king crowned and, rather extraordinarily, Csincsik was still in the hunt. Should results have fallen his way, he might have built such a strong lead across the Berlin and Rome Majors that it was enough to do the job on its own. Either way, he would surely be due a decent slice of the prize money pie in any case.
The aforementioned €40,000 prize pool on offer was to be split up in an intriguing way. A quarter of the money would go between the eleven drivers who had ultimately attended the Grand Final whilst that remaining would be rewarded upon total championship order. Now all there was to do was race and find out who got what.
Qualifying
Unlike the Majors, qualifying would confirm two grids instead of one. The ‘Charge’ preceded a full E-Prix distance and would see the person setting the slowest time of drivers eliminated in the duel shoot-out on pole position. That person would be Risto Kappet.
Dawid Mroczek faced down one of the favourites, Lucas Müller, and won out to take a timely pole position for the double points marathon to come. Jernej Simončič, the driver with the most championship points contending this day, and Brendon Leigh made up the second row whilst Petar Brljak would be downbeat with sixth.
Charge
The Czech pilot, therefore, needed to make the most of a third-place starting position for the Charge. His early assault on Manuel Biancolilla resulted in no positions gained whilst Kappet shot off following a strong launch. Only the top five scored points in this sprint to the chequered flag, thus Main Race pole sitter Mroczek losing a spot on the opening lap was far from ideal for him.
Two uses of Attack Mode would be required across the ten laps of action and Brljak was eager to get them out of the way. This, of course, cost him positions in the short term losing out to both Leigh and Müller by the fifth tour. Compounding the issue was a failure to hit his markers correctly at the first time of trying.
With so little time, passing was ultimately held at a premium. Nobody was passing Kappet, however, as the Estonian overcame fever to bag an essential 25-point haul. With a top-five finish in the Main Race, he would be in the hunt for the championship.
Formula E Accelerate London 2023 Charge results
- Risto Kappet
- Manuel Biancolilla
- Brendon Leigh
- Lucas Müller
- Petar Brljak
Main Race
Much as Kappet enjoyed his closest rivals going at each other in the Charge, Mroczek was offered a free getaway. Müller was ultra-aggressive into Turn 1, placing him at the mercy of Simončič who battled hard to claim second six corners on. The German’s day would go from bad to worse as a tangle with Leigh through the old slalom section removed his front wing.
It was fair to say that, despite great fortune to be in London considering an energy-level-based error in Rome, the day just wouldn’t give the two-times Formula 1 Esports champion a break. Plagued by technical issues in both practice and qualifying, this clash had curtailed his hopes of winning.
Leigh’s fall was Brljak’s gain; third position now in his possession. His grasp on it would grow ever the tighter given Isaac Gillissen’s skittish defence of fourth. Leigh and done well to recover back up to fifth but could not find a good opportunity to strike the Dutchman without literal contact.
Ultimately, he wouldn’t have to make the pass as Gillissen’s evident lack of control finally bit him with ten laps remaining. A spin out of Turn 21 opened up the floodgates behind which should have been the moment Leigh could sense decent points getting ever closer. When it rains, though, it pours. The Brit was about to be sodden.
A total of three missed activations of Attack Mode annihilated the opportunity to break away from Biancolilla. A fourth trip through the ‘joker’ route finally saw the Brit concede to the Spaniard which forced his hand on the last lap. It ended in disaster, with a lunge into the 180-degree turnaround into 10 tearing off his front wing; the same exact fate of Müller whom he had fought earlier.
Mroczek, of course, was miles clear of this and indeed Simončič with Brljak in tow. His double points victory easily assured him of top prize by becoming the London LAN winner, and by virtue of the series format, the overall champion.
The two Burst Esports stablemates gave plenty of praise to each other; Mroczek going as far as to suggest that he expected Simončič to be the faster of the pair with him playing rear-gunner to aid in securing the title. On why it all clicked together that day, he paid specific mention to the nature of the track itself.
“I think the fact that I was leading obviously gave me a huge benefit on this track,” said Mroczek
“It’s incredibly hard to follow here so I knew I had an advantage with that. Sometimes I could coast in places – not drive to the absolute limit – and it worked out.
“In the end, I was faster doing this. What can I say?!”
Formula E Accelerate 2023, London final main race results
- Dawid Mroczek
- Jernej Simončič
- Petar Brljak
- Manuel Biancolilla
- Risto Kappet
- Lucas Müller
- Brendon Leigh
- Jacob Reid
- Isaac Gillissen
- Martin Murguly
Formula E Accelerate 2023 final championship standings
- Dawid Mroczek
- Risto Kappet
- Manuel Biancolilla
- Petar Brljak
- Jernej Simončič
- Lucas Müller
- Brendon Leigh
- Jacob Reid
- Isaac Gillissen
- Martin Murguly
- Leonard Krippner
Image credit: Burst Esport and Jernej Simončič
