Williams Esports achieve triple success in blockbuster weekend of action


Alongside an excellent result in the Bahrain GP for both Alex Albon and Logan Sargeant on Sunday, Williams Esports won two races and became champions of two series in a blockbuster weekend for the team.

After six rounds of competition, the Williams Esports BenQ car of Vasilios Beletsiotis and Atte Kauppinen won the 24h Series overall championship.

Having won at Sebring, Monza and the Nurburgring earlier in the season, the team went into the final round with a 12-point lead over their nearest rivals.

It was an intense event, with a special points system for the finale paying out the usual end-of-race points at the 6h halfway mark (including 20 points for P1), and then additional ‘double points’ at the finish - meaning there was a maximum of 60 points on offer, rather than the usual 20.

Vasilios and Atte struggled to match the stint length of their rivals and ran around P4-P5 for the early stages. They managed to climb back to P3 at the halfway mark and kept themselves in the lead battle for the duration of the closely-fought race.

In-race penalties for the other leading cars kept the order fluctuating, but in the end the BenQ car was able to finish P2, just 12 seconds ahead of title rivals MSI Esports in P3, which secured the title.

Our win in the 24h Series was backed up by another championship success in the VCOxLFM FLExTREME, in what was arguably the race of that season.

Earlier in the series, the team of Daire McCormack, Igor Rodrigues and Tinko van der Velde had won two races in the top tier ‘Cash Spilt’ category, setting them up for a great chance to win the championship in the final round at Paul Ricard - as long as they beat their nearest competitors, BS+ Competition.

With an hour to go, the teams were neck and neck at the front of the pack. Daire had to chase down and then overtake the lead driver for BS+, Nils Naujoks. While he was able to pass relatively easily, Daire couldn’t shake his rival, which made for a nail-biting last half hour as the Irishman had to defend the lead time and again, as Naujoks looked for a way back ahead.

Naujoks sent an optimistic move on the last corner of the last lap, but he’d had to come from too deep, which gave Daire the opportunity to execute a perfect switchback and reclaim the lead to the line - claiming the race win and the overall championship as well. Both drivers commended each other afterwards for the intense but completely fair battle - a great advert for sim racing.

The team also got off to a great start in the RCI 6h Challenge, with the Williams Esports Razer car of Charlie Crossland and Tinko Van der Velde winning from pole in dominant fashion.

The other Williams entry, the Chillblast-branded car of Igor Rodrigues and Vojtech Fiala, also showed great pace and ran P2 for much of the race. Unfortunately, Williams were denied a formation 1-2 finish in the closing stages when the Chillblast car picked up a penalty and dropped down the order.

The victory rounded off a great weekend of action for the team and added two more pieces of silverware to the team’s trophy cabinet.

They now look ahead to the next weekend, when they’ll try to claim another title in the iRacing DNLS finale, and contest the first online round of the new ESL R1 season on Rennsport.

Catch all the action live on the Williams Esports Twitch Channel.