The latest news from the FIA Motorsport Games
Find out the latest updates from the third edition of the FIA Motorsport Games which will be held in Valencia, Spain, from October 23-27.
GT: Germany sets impressive pace in Free Practice 2
October 25, 2024
Germany laid down a marker in this afternoon’s Free Practice 2 at Circuit Ricardo Tormo, taking top spot in the 80-minute session by the better part of a second.Finn Wielbelhaus set the time – a 1m32.358s – at the wheel of the Mercedes-AMG he shares with Hubert Haupt. Both drivers showed impressive speed around the 4km circuit, suggesting that Team Germany is the early favourite to secure GT gold.
But the competition will not be conceding defeat just yet. The Great Britain Ferrari was second quickest thanks to Chris Froggatt’s 1m33.179s, narrowly ahead of Switzerland’s Yannick Mettler and France’s Paul Evrard. Ivan Pelkin (Ukraine), King Ling (China) and Jonas Karklys (Lithuania) were also in the mix, with seventh tenths separating P2 from P7.
As was the case in FP1, the Team Japan Ferrari caused the only red flag period of the session. It occurred at the same corner (Turn 12) and with the same driver at the wheel (Kei Nakanishi), and once again the car did not suffer any significant damage.
The GT contenders will be back on-track at 16:15 for Qualifying, which marks the start of live YouTube coverage from the 2024 FIA Motorsport Games. Two sessions will run back to back, with one driver per crew setting a time in each. The car’s average time across the two sessions sets the grid for the Qualifying Race, which runs tomorrow at 11:05.
Rally: Spain takes early advantage after three gravel stages
October 25, 2024
Team Spain enjoyed a flying start to grab the Overall and Gravel class leads in the Rally2 and Rally4 categories on Friday morning, while Great Britain and Italy head Historic Rally.
The action kicked off with a trio of stages held on the mountainous dirt roads to the west of Valencia. Following a further three legs this afternoon, a Super Special Stage will conclude the itinerary at Circuit Ricardo Tormo.
A gold medal awaits the fastest crews in each of the dedicated Rally2, Rally4 and Historic Rally Gravel divisions, while the combined times at the end of the day will carry forward for the nations contesting the Overall categories ahead of Sunday’s deciding Medals Stage.
Spain bolted to a clean sweep of stages in Rally2. Alejandro Cachón / Borja Rozada topped the leader board in their Toyota GR Yaris, finishing the three routes with a total time of 28:27.3s. Hot on their heels is Türkiye’s Ali Türkkan / Oytun Albayrak, who sit 33.5s further back after a hat-trick of second-fastest runs aboard their Ford Fiesta. Oliver Mellors / Ian Windress (Proton Iriz) from Great Britain occupy third at the break.
The host nation has entered an alternative line-up of Jose Antonio Saurez / Alberto Inglesias Pin to specialise in Rally2 Gravel. The Spanish pair sit first in class at the break; the Škoda Fabia runners stopped the clock at 28:28.7s to edge Türkiye and fellow Fabia entrants Rokas Steponavičius / Dovydas Ketvirtis for Lithuania.
Topping the overall Rally4 order is Sergi Perez / Axel Coronado as Spain’s stars continued to excel. They sit 18.7s clear of Team Slovakia representatives Martin Koči / Petr Těšínský – fastest on Stage 3 from Utiel to Calderon. Brazilian duo Luis Eduardo Stedile / Carlos Enrique Morales were third quickest. With those countries all contesting the specialist Rally4 Gravel category, the top three carries over.
Ben Mellor / Alex Lee have placed Great Britain at the front in Historic Rally, the Toyota Celica pair ending the morning with a combined time of 33:40.5s. Reigning gold medallist Italy (Andrea Zivian / Nicola Arena) twice finished second. Added to a third place in the opening stage, they are the current runners-up. Father-and-son duo Kjell and Peter Fransson guided their Renault Alpine A310 to third for Sweden.
Zivian / Arena’s run in their 1981 Audi quattro earns top spot in Historic Rally Gravel. They lead Great Britain’s dedicated gravel line-up of Ernie and Anna Graham (Ford Escort RS) by a slender 10s. Kim Sevius / Alexander Alin hold third in their Volvo 544 Sport as part of a rotated entry for Sweden.
The Rally schedule resumes at 14:23 local time.
Touring Car: Team Argentina Powers Honda to Practice 1 Lead
October 25, 2024
Touring Car was the last category, but certainly not least, to complete its first practice around Circuit Ricardo Tormo.
Team Argentina stole the best time in the closing minutes of the session, posting a lap of one minute, 40.106 seconds. Ignacio Montenegro, driving a Honda Civic Type R FL5 TCR, finished ahead Team France’s Aurelien Comte in second and Team Spain’s Eric Gene Casanovas in third, both of whom are driving CUPRA Leon VZs this weekend in Valencia.
The session was interrupted by a brief yellow flag just prior to the halfway mark.
Touring Car has an additional practice on Friday afternoon 15:35 local time to end the day. Live timing is available here.
Formula 4: Team Greece sets the pace in opening sessions
October 25, 2024
Team Greece paced the opening Formula 4 session at Circuit Ricardo Tormo, with Philippe-Armand Karras doing just enough to see off the challenge of the host nation.
Things were always going to be tight with all drivers using the latest generation Tatuus F4-T421, with chassis being randomly allocated to teams via a blind draw.
Karras’ best effort left him just 0.059s ahead of Team Spain driver Juan Cota Alonso, as the two secured the top spots. Team Israel was third, with its driver Ariel Elkin, who has experience from competing in both the USA and Spanish F4.
Just 0.1s covered the top four, with Francisco Macedo putting Team Portugal fourth, ahead of Team Peru’s Andres Cardenas and Team Australia’s Griffin Peebles. Team Sri Lanka’s David Yevan and Team United Kingdom’s Reza Seewooruthun completed the top eight.
The next session takes place at 17:05 local time.
Esports GT: Brazil, Czechia and Japan book their Semi-Final slots
October 25, 2024
The Teams from Brazil, Czechia and Japan booked their place at the front of tomorrow’s Esports GT Semi-Finals by emerging victorious from a trio of Quarter-Final contests this morning at the City of Arts & Sciences in Valencia.
With the top 10 from each race progressing straight to Saturday’s Semi-Finals, the pressure was on to not make mistakes early on. Two of the three pole-sitters followed that to the letter, with both Brazil and Czechia controlling their outings. However, misfortune denied Team Australia victory in the last outing, opening the door for Japan to hit the front.
Team Brazil got the day off to a flying start with Igor De Oliveira Rodrigues dominating the opening Quarter-Final to book the nation’s space on the front row of tomorrow’s Semi-Finals.
Rodrigues started on pole and pulled well clear to win comfortably ahead of Team Belgium’s Mathias Kühn and Team Venezuela’s Gabriel Parra. There were a few upsets, including a collision and a spin for defending gold medallist Team United Kingdom that left Kieran Prendergast down in 14th.
Vojtech Fiala and Niklas Houben were the class of the second Quarter-Final, with Team Czechia and Team Germany running away from the pack. Fiala controlled the race throughout, with Houben never more than 1.5s behind as both cruised into the Semis. Team Republic of South Korea was third thanks to Youngchan Kim.
The third Quarter-Final proved the most dramatic, when contact between long-time leader Team Australia and the chasing Team Morocco opened the door for a Team Japan victory.
Philippa Boquida led the majority of the race ahead of Ahmed Erquizi and Sota Muto but a tap from behind by the Morocco Mercedes-AMG sent the Australian one wide with 9 minutes to go, allowing Muto to slip past them both. Boquida recovered for second, with Erquizi completing the podium.
For those who did hit trouble, this afternoon’s Last Chance race gives one final opportunity to remain in the competition. They begin from 15:35.
Single-Make GT: Team Georgia Tops First Practice
October 25, 2024
A stampede of Ferraris practiced around Circuit Ricardo Tormo on Friday morning, with Team Georgia and driver Davit Kajaia emerging the quickest with a time of one minute, 34.285 seconds.
Second on the Practice 1 charts was Ivan Velasco Sanchez driving for Team Spain and third went to Team Germany’s Axel Sartingen, while the top six drivers were separated by less than one second. The session ran without incidents.
Making up Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli – the official Single-Make GT category of this year’s FIA Motorsport Games – are 11 Ferrari 296 Challenge racecars. The model made its worldwide debut earlier this year across multiple international and national series.
A second practice for the category will take place Friday afternoon at 2:40pm local time. Live timing for all Single-Make GT sessions is available here.
Karting: All categories get underway at Aspar
October 25, 2024
The Karting discipline is underway at the 2024 FIA Motorsport Games with all four categories in action during the opening morning at the Aspar Circuit, just south of Valencia city centre.
Karting Sprint Jnr – for drivers aged 11-14 – kicked off proceedings with Team Portugal’s Martim Meneses topping Free Practice 1, ahead of Team Greece’s Nikolaos Karagiannis and Team Estonia’s Theodor Toobal.
The Karting Sprint Snr category was next up, as drivers aged over 14 acclimatised themselves to the 1.448 km circuit.
Team Andorra’s Alex Machado set the pace with an impressive 1:02.272s lap time on his final tour, ahead of Team Chechia’s Václav Procházka and Peruvian Taylor Greenfield.
Such has been the vast entry for the Karting Mini category – making its FIA Motorsport Games debut in 2024 – that the 40-strong entry is split into two groups for practice sessions.
For drivers aged 8-11 years old – some of the youngest to compete anywhere on the FIA Motorsport Games schedule – it was Xavier Lázaro continuing Portugal’s solid morning at Aspar by taking P1. Luxembourg’s Alexandre Point and Sweden’s Benjamin Poulsen was third.
All three aforementioned categories are back on-track for their respective second practice sessions, before Karting Endurance joins the fray later this morning. The serious business commences with numerous Qualifying Practice sessions beginning at 15:25 CET.
You can keep up to date with karting live timing here, whilst a full list of results will be published throughout the day here.
GT: China strikes first as free practice kicks off busy day at Circuit Ricardo Tormo
October 25, 2024
Track action is now fully underway at the 2024 FIA Motorsport Games after the GT contenders completed Free Practice 1 at Circuit Ricardo Tormo this morning.
The 80-minute session gave the category’s hopefuls a chance to sample the 4km track, though an 08:30 CEST start ensured that the surface was slick when the.green flag flew. The Qatari Porsche was the first car out with Ibrahim Al Abdulghani at the wheel, while Chris Froggatt was first to break the two-minute barrier aboard the Great Britain Ferrari.
There was significant progress thereafter, with the benchmark lap whittled down to the mid 1m30s by the time the chequered flag was displayed. This was aided by climbing track temperatures, which allowed drivers to take full advantage of their Pirelli rubber.
Team China’s Audi led the way thanks to a late 1m35.109s from Yaqi Zhang. He edged Hubert Haupt (Germany), who posted a 1m35.251s aboard his Mercedes-AMG, with the Ukrainian Audi completing the top three thanks to Ivan Pelkin. Roughly half a second covered the top seven, which also featured Switzerland, Spain, the Great Britain and Lithuania.
The session ran largely uninterrupted, save for a brief red flag on the hour mark when the Team Japan Ferrari stopped at Turn 12. There was no obvious damage to the car, which was able to restart and return to the pits under its own power. The GT contenders will be back on-track at 12:30 CEST for a second 80-minute Free Practice session.
Esports GT kick starts a big day at the FIA Motorsport Games
October 25, 2024
The opening race action of the day comes to you live from Valencia’s City of Arts and Sciences, where the 57 nation Esports GT field will play out its Quarter-Finals this morning. The Esports F4 grid will follow this afternoon.
Hungary and Germany on the pace in Karting Slalom
October 24, 2024
Karting Slalom kicked off on Thursday with testing, qualifying sessions, and the opening races, with Team Hungary and Team Germany among those enjoying a stellar first day of action.
The category – part of the Electric Street discipline alongside Auto Slalom – offers an accessible and affordable entry point to motorsport for junior participants aged 14-16 years who hold a National Karting licence.
With participants driving identical electric karts through a parallel slalom course in a relay format, the fastest teams progress through to a knock-out phase of head-to-head time trials, culminating in the Final to determine the gold medal winners.
When the dust settled on the opening day of the Karting Slalom competition Team Hungary’s Balázs Sturcz and Anna Benedek set the pace in qualifying. Their combined time, with penalties taken into account, was a little over three seconds clear of Germany (Louis Stange / Maja Braun), with Lithuania (Linas Volungevi / Meda Mickeliūna) slotting into third.
The top 16 from today’s sessions will progress to the next phase on Saturday morning. This will be whittled down to eight for the afternoon’s Quarter-Final, followed by Semi-Finals and the medal-deciding contests on Sunday.
Germany is the defending gold medallist, having triumphed over Belgium at the 2022 edition.
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