PESC: Alejandro Sánchez, Diogo Pinto take Texas-sized wins at COTA

The fourth race of the 2023 Porsche TAG Heuer Esports Supercup season stayed in the United States this week as the Top 30 iRacing road racers took on Circuit of the Americas on Saturday (18th March).

After a wild card round of PESC at the fan-voted Long Beach Circuit two weeks ago, things were much more spread out and calm in Texas. Run-offs and off-tracks would be a factor, but in both the All-Stars and World Championship series, each of the races would come down to battles on the final lap.

Both Casey Kirwan and The Pulpo López would take wins in All-Stars as Emree would podium in both races in the series’ first races in the 718 Cayman GT4. Over in the Supercup, both Alejandro Sánchez and Diogo Pinto would find victory lane in respective races.

CASEY KIRWAN INCHES FROM SWEEP, PULPO LOPEZ FAST IN FIRST START

A newcomer on the season, Pablo “The Pulpo” López came out of the gates swinging at COTA to kick off the All-Stars event. López took the pole position over eNASCAR’s Casey Kirwan and led off the starting line early in the seven lap Sprint.

Kirwan, Emily “Emree” Jones and and Tyson “Quirkitized” Meier were all under a blanket behind López through the entirety of the Sprint, but with two laps to go, things changed up front.

After toying with the top spot for a few laps, Kirwan was finally able to wrestle it away from López and score yet another victory on the season. Emree rounded out the podium and Keny500 would invert to the pole position for the Feature after finishing last.

ALL-STARS: COTA SPRINT RACE TOP 10 RESULTS

FIN	STA	CAR #	DRIVER	INTERVAL	SPRINT PTS	AGG PTS
1	2	95	Casey Kirwan	7 LAPS	25	25
2	1	504	The Pulpo López	+1.001 sec	20	23
3	3	51	Emree	+1.304 sec	17	17
4	4	1	Quirkitized	+2.013 sec	15	15
5	5	83	Matt Malone	+3.559 sec	12	12
6	8	39	Jardier	+6.403 sec	10	10
7	7	23	Heikkie360ES	+11.098 sec	9	9
8	6	35	Dan Suzuki	+11.413 sec	8	8
9	13	37	Basic Ollie	+13.675 sec	7	7
10	14	56	Borja Zazo	+17.570 sec	6	6

With the complete flip of the grid to start the 12 lap feature, many times the faster drivers have a tough time getting back to the front. At COTA, this wasn’t necessarily the case.

While López ended up making contact with Jaroslav “Jardier” Honzik on the opening lap, and others in the midfield colliding on the second lap, the podium finishers from the Sprint were all able to easily make their way back to the front of the field.

Keny500 did his best to hang on to the lead, but López was too strong and took over just before halfway. Both Kirwan and Emree managed to also get by, but only Kirwan was able to stay in the draft. Off of the final corner of the final lap, they drag raced to the line. López was victorious by 0.057 seconds.

ALL-STARS: COTA FEATURE RACE TOP 10 RESULTS

FIN	STA	CAR #	DRIVER	INTERVAL	FT. PTS	TOTAL PTS
1	13	504	The Pulpo López	12 LAPS	25	48
2	14	95	Casey Kirwan	+0.057 sec	21	46
3	13	51	Emree	+0.760 sec	17	34
4	1	182	Keny500	+6.346 sec	14	16
5	3	786	Dave Cam	+6.542 sec	12	16
6	8	23	Heikki360ES	+11.369 sec	10	19
7	7	35	Dan Suzuki	+12.891 sec	9	17
8	9	39	Jardier	+16.834 sec	8	18
9	10	83	Matt Malone	+17.373 sec	7	19
10	11	1	Quirkitized	+18.660 sec	6	21

With four races in the books, the question doesn’t look to be if anyone can catch Casey Kirwan anymore, but rather who will win the battle for second place through fifth place.

With a podium pair of finishes, the 2021 All-Stars champion Emree moves up to the runner-up position, now seven points ahead of both Jardier and last year’s champion Quirkitized. Heikki360ES moves up to fifth while the part-time Laurin Heinrich falls to sixth. The Pulpo López is 14th after his one event start.

ALL-STARS: POINTS STANDINGS AFTER EVENT #4 – COTA

POS	CAR #	DRIVER	SP. WINS	FT. WINS	TOP 5s	TOTAL PTS	BEHIND
1	95	Casey Kirwan	2	1	8	176	LEADER
2	51	Emree	0	0	4	93	-83
3	39	Jardier	0	1	2	86	-90
4	1	Quirkitized	0	0	4	86	-90
5	23	Heikki360ES	0	0	3	78	-98
6	911	Laurin Heinrich	2	0	3	78	-98
7	37	Basic Ollie	0	0	3	75	-101
8	56	Borja Zazo	0	0	2	68	-108
9	786	Dave Cam	0	1	2	67	-109
10	81	Stradi	0	0	2	58	-118

RACING GETS CALMER AT COTA

Long Beach was, for lack of a better term, exciting in every way possible. Flips, carnage, battles for the lead, and ultimately, there was chaos in the 39 total laps among the two race events.

This week, while still on the streets of the United States, there was way more room for activities around the 3.427-mile, 5.52-kilometer venue in Austin, Texas.

Alejandro Sánchez scored the pole position over Sebastian Job by 0.028 seconds. Jordan Caruso, Yohann Harth and the rookie Lasse Bak rounded out the Top 5 qualifying position, each driver earning points from 10 points to the pole sitter to two points for fifth.

THE SPRINT RACE

It was an ideal start to the Sprint as the field safely navigated the opening hairpin corner of the race. Sánchez was able to scoot away from Job as Caruso would fall behind Harth before the end of the lap.

For the most part, the Top 8 stayed the same through the eight laps in the Sprint. The Top 7 was the same besides the Harth-Caruso flip for the podium, but the battle for eighth was a crucial part of the race.

Coming into the race, Charlie Collins held the points lead over Caruso by 13 points. His lead was 51 points over Job and 56 over the defending champion Diogo Pinto, who wound up on his lid last week at Long Beach.

If Collins could hold on to the position, Pinto would be at a disadvantage for the Feature while Collins would invert to the top spot, potentially allowing for him to increase his points lead. Pinto acted upon this notion and before halfway, he made the move for the transfer spot.

Meanwhile up front, Sánchez was being kept honest by Job. Despite a few off-track incident points accumulated through the opening race, the two made it around safely.

Sánchez scored his first win of the season and the first for the Stormforce Racing ART colors. Pinto was able to hold off a late charge from Collins to get the eighth spot to invert to the pole.

PESC: COTA SPRINT RACE TOP 10 RESULTS

FIN	STA	CAR #	DRIVER	TEAM	INTERVAL	PTS	AGG PTS
1	1	47	Alejandro Sánchez	Stormforce Racing ART	8 LAPS	25	35
2	2	22	Sebastian Job	Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports	+0.562 sec	22	30
3	4	90	Yohann Harth	Stormforce Racing ART	+2.373 sec	20	24
4	3	12	Jordan Caruso	Altus Esports	+3.640 sec	18	24
5	5	24	Lasse Bak	FYRA SimSport	+4.254 sec	16	18
6	7	49	Jamie Fluke	Apex Racing Team	+4.539 sec	15	15
7	6	11	Maximilian Benecke	MOUZ	+4.935 sec	14	14
8	10	1	Diogo C. Pinto	Team Redline	+5.352 sec	13	13
9	8	93	Charlie Collins	VRS Coanda Esports	+5.727 sec	12	12
10	11	28	Sam Kuitert	URANO eSports	+6.788 sec	11	11

THE FEATURE RACE

While the first race was relatively tame, the second race would get way more heated with more points and implications on the line. On the first lap, the 2020 series champion Job would be forced out of the battle for the win almost immediately. The culprit? One bad case of netcode.

Pinto, after inverting to the lead, would hold the wheel steady over two ESL R1 competitors in Maximilian Benecke and Jamie Fluke for the opening half while Caruso bided his time in fourth. Collins was coming up through the pack, trying to maintain the points lead through the US events.

Things started to get physical as the laps wound down. The rookies Lasse Bak and Gustavo Ariel would find trouble just before halfway after Bak went around attempting to race for the fifth position. Ariel had nowhere to go and the two would find themselves out of contention.

Closer to the end, Caruso began to make his move. First, it was Fluke, then Benecke. As Caruso set his sights on Pinto for the top spot, Benecke and Fluke made contact, allowing Sánchez a chance to take another podium finish.

In the final two laps, Caruso and Pinto traded both the lead spot and some virtual paint. It looked as though Caruso had the better tire, but Pinto was able to take the lead back at the right times using slipstream and braking zones. Pinto held on and collected his first career Feature win.

PESC: COTA FEATURE RACE TOP 10 RESULTS

FIN	STA	CAR #	DRIVER	TEAM	INTERVAL	PTS	TOTAL PTS
1	1	1	Diogo C. Pinto	Team Redline	16 LAPS	50	63
2	5	12	Jordan Caruso	Altus Esports	+0.176 sec	45	69
3	8	47	Alejandro Sánchez	Stormforce Racing ART	+1.066 sec	40	75
4	3	49	Jamie Fluke	Apex Racing Team	+1.817 sec	37	52
5	9	93	Charlie Collins	VRS Coanda Esports	+2.099 sec	34	46
6	11	37	Cooper Webster	Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports	+3.468 sec	31	41
7	6	90	Yohann Harth	Stormforce Racing ART	+4.382 sec	28	52
8	12	4	Salva Talens	Stormforce Racing ART	+4.830 sec	26	35
9	14	81	Quentiin Vialatte	R8G Esports	+5.420 sec	24	31
10	2	11	Maximilian Benecke	MOUZ	+6.775 sec	22	36

POINTS STANDINGS LEAVING LONG BEACH

Collins was able to fight up to a fifth place finish, his sixth of the season. Caruso, however, collected his sixth and seventh of the season at COTA and now leads the standings by 10 points over Collins.

Pinto’s Feature win moves him back up into third while Job fell back down to fourth after finishing 14th in the Feature. Job is now 63 points behind the lead, which is not insurmountable with six race events to go still.

The battle for fifth seems to have taken on its own storyline as Cooper Webster has had the consistency to put himself in that spot. Sánchez and Harth, both with penalties on the season, are the closest to taking that fifth spot away. Zac Campbell did not have a good two races on virtual American and now sits in eighth.

PESC: POINTS STANDINGS AFTER EVENT #4 – COTA

POS	CAR #	DRIVER	TEAM	SP. WINS	FT. WINS	T5s	TOTAL PTS
1	12	Jordan Caruso	Altus Esports	0	0	7	253*
2	93	Charlie Collins	VRS Coanda Esports	0	1	6	243
3	1	Diogo C. Pinto	Team Redline	1	1	5	204*
4	22	Sebastian Job	Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports	0	1	5	190*
5	37	Cooper Webster	Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports	0	0	3	161
6	47	Alejandro Sánchez	Stormforce Racing ART	1	0	4	158*
7	90	Yohann Harth	Stormforce Racing ART	0	0	2	145*
8	15	Zac Campbell	VRS Coanda Esports	1	1	2	123
9	77	Alessandro Bico	Williams Esports	0	0	1	94*
10	49	Jamie Fluke	Apex Racing Team	0	0	1	93*

UP NEXT: ORACLE RED BULL RACING ESPORTS RING

PESC heads to Austria on April Fools Day for the fifth round of the 2023 season. Last year, Charlie Collins took the Sprint victory while Sebastian Job was able to win a home race Feature for his team, Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports.

The broadcast will be primarily advertised for the Porsche Motorsports social channels, although like eNASCAR, it will also find itself on the iRacing social channels. The broadcast kicks off around 2:00 pm ET / 6:00 pm GMT / 7:00 pm BST for the All-Stars while the World Championship goes off an hour later.

2023 PORSCHE TAG HEUER ESPORTS SUPERCUP SCHEDULE

EVENT	DATE	VENUE	Sprint Laps	Feature Laps
1	4-Feb	Hockenheimring Baden-Württemberg	9	18
2	18-Feb	Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours	10	20
3	4-Mar	Long Beach – FAN VOTE WINNER	13	26
4	18-Mar	Circuit of the Americas	8	16
5	1-Apr	Red Bull Ring	10	20
6	8-Apr	Watkins Glen International	11	22
7	22-Apr	Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps	6	12
8	6-May	Nürburgring Combined	3	4
9	20-May	Circuit des 24 Heures du Mans	3	6
10	3-Jun	Autodromo Nazionale Monza	7	14