The endurance championship will officially return in September for its seventh edition
With Season 6 in the history books, it is already time to think about the new year of racing on rFactor 2 here at e-Racing Series. Get ready to hit the track in September in an LMP2, an GT3or one of the 4 Hypercar available (with the brand new BMW M Hybrid V8, based on the Bayro M Hybrid V8)!
The amazing Bayro M Hybrid V8 dressed up in the BMW M Team RLL liveries from ASMG
Regarding Hypercars, we are working on a series of adjustments to car physics and a new BOP to ensure the competitiveness of all cars (we don't want a new season of the 963 series 😝)
(The 963 cup didn't look so bad after all)We already unveiled the first big news of the upcoming year, let's break down everything else you need to know.
Signing up to Season 7
This year will continue to use a sign up phase.
This will mainly take place in August. With the first Preaseason scheduled in September, teams and drivers will have the time to enjoy some well deserved rest in August, and be ready to go full throttle in September.
In the first phase, we will send out invites to the teams to come and join us, indicating the class (or classes) we think suits them better. By replying to our invite, drivers will benefit from a big discount on the entry fee.
When this first sign up session will be over, public sign ups will open. In this second stage, teams can freely sign up to the LMP2 and GT3 classes.
In order to apply for a spot in Hypercar, teams which did not receive an invite must send a request to ersracedirection@gmail.com, bringing proof of your palmares in endurance championships across the simracing community.
This is the complete schedule for sign ups:
- 31st of July - 4th of August: Invites will be prepared
- 5th-18th of August: Invites will be sent out
- 19th-31th of August: Public sign ups
The time separating the end of sign ups and the first preseason race will be used to fill the vacancies in the grid.
CURRENT PHASE IS: INVITES PREPARATION
During this phase we will prepare invitations for the teams we know well and who participated in all the races last season, If you think your team deserves an invitation, send a request to ersracedirection@gmail.com, bringing proof of your palmares in endurance championships across the simracing community.
Cars, classes and schedule
Aside from the new Hypercar (BMW M Hybrid V8), LMP2 PRO and PRO AM, GT3 PRO and GT3 AM will stay, featuring the same car models from season 6.
Here is the complete list of cars that we will see on track:
- [HC] Toyota GR010**
- [HC] Ferrari 499P
- [HC] Porsche 963
- [HC] BMW M Hybrid V8**
- [LMP2] Oreca 07*
- [GT3] Aston Martin Vantage GT3*
- [GT3] Audi R8 GT3 2020*
- [GT3] BMW M4 GT3*
- [GT3] Callaway Corvette C7 GT3-R*
- [GT3] Ferrari 488 GT3*
- [GT3] McLaren 720s GT3*
- [GT3] Mercedes AMG GT3*
- [GT3] Porsche 911 GT3R*
*DLC
** URD Payware content
Races, tracks and official schedule
Since we liked a lot the Season 6 schedule and races, Season 7 will see some minor adjustment and an significant increase in competition hours (a total of +8hrs from Season 6). While iconic track such as Bahrain, Imola, Istanbul, Sebring, SPA, Le Mans will stay, the eSport Endurance Series, after the 12hrs of season 4, will return to Daytona and debut in Brasil at the recently updated San Paolo Circuit. Race day will still be Saturday, with the start of the weekend at (differently from last years) 12:00 Server Time (Rome time).
Here is the full detailed schedule of the championship:
- [14/09/2024 - Preseason] - 2h of Indianapolis
- [12/10/2024 - R1] - 6h of Bahrain*
- [09/11/2024 - R2] - 6h of Imola*
- [14/12/2024 - R3] - 6h of Istanbul
- [11/01/2025 - R4] - 12h of Daytona*
- [08/02/2025 - R5] - 6h of San Paolo
- [08/03/2025 - R6] - 1000 miles of Sebring*
- [12/04/2025 - R7] - 8h of Spa Francorchamps*
- [13/06/2025 - R8] - 24h of Le Mans Qualy*
- [21/06/2025 - R8] - 24h of Le Mans - Race*
*DLC content
Rules Updates
As announced, we made some small adjustment to official Championship Rulebook, here you will find a small summary
Prizes:
This entire league is completely financed (TS, Streaming, Commentary, Game Server, RD) from entry fees (which stays very low, compared to other major endurance league) so we can't continue with last years money prizes, simple as that. Neverthless, we will continue to guarantee prizes for every category, but this year there will be only for each class winner with the amount to be communicated at the end of the subscription phase in any case not exceeding €100 per team.
Timetable:
In order to try to have a more suitable times for everyone, this year we will anticipate our timetable a bit. Since Season 7, our official weekend will start at 12:00 Server Time (Rome Time) with the vocal briefing. All the Race Sessions (except from the 24h of Le Mans which stays at 15:00 ST) will start at 13:00 ST.
BOP:
Differently from last year, during Season 7 the manufacturer ballast will not extend to the overall class and will work (like the crew ballast) only within the Class. This will mainly mean that we will have 2 completely separate BOP, one for the GT3 PRO and one for the GT3 AM.
But the big news is that we will apply the BOP rules also to the Hypercar class! Also in this class we will have the crew ballast trying to balance the SOF of the class.
Final Thoughts
So, now you know a little bit (actually a lot) more about Season 7. Let's leave here some Useful Link for the season:
- Main championship Forum (Here you will find all the signup info, race topics, livery and so on): CLICK ME
- Championship HUB (Here you will find the schedule, protests, server info and so on): CLICK ME
- Championship Entries: CLICK ME
- Championship Standings (currently displaying S6 final standings): CLICK ME
Last things to say is that we will have a test server ready to hit the track starting from Monday 05/08* (Make sure to own all DLCs and the Moyoda GR010 and Bayro M Hybrid V8 from United Racing Designs, available here and to subscribe the official Workshop here)
*HC could delay a bit in order to release the new dedicated physics update!
Server details will be shared on the championship HUB page!
Make sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram and to join our Discord community, where we tend to post some sneak peeks and anticipations.