French racer Pierre Ragues will return to action with the Signatech Alpine Elf squad in the Virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans, which is set to take place over the weekend of June 13-14.

 

The Esports event, which is being organised by the FIA World Endurance Championship, the Le Mans organisers Automobile Club de l'Ouest and Motorsport Games, is being held on the same weekend that the iconic event would have taken place, prior to its postponement to September.

 

Pierre will be racing on the rFactor 2 platform alongside racers in 49 other cars, with 30 LMP competitors and 20 from the GTE category. He will be tasked with defending the colours of Signatech Alpine Elf - winners of the classic 24-hour event in 2016, 2018 and 2019 - alongside his regular team-mates Thomas Laurent and André Negrão, as well as professional simracer Nicolas Longuet. The quartet will be racing in the same LMP set-up as their rivals, offering a uniquely equal playing field from the outset. 

 

Racing around the legendary Circuit de la Sarthe in a virtual competition will be new territory for most but the nuances of the gruelling track will remain just as real. The team is preparing for the race just as it would any other, with close attention to all the physical and psychological challenges that Esports offers. Pierre has plenty of sim experience having worked closely with specialists Ellip6 over many years and is familiar with the rFactor platform. 

 

While drawing from his own experiences in sim racing, Pierre will also have full support from the team, with an operations engineer and data engineer on hand throughout the 24 hours. It will mark the first competition for Pierre and the team since COTA back in February and will offer a timely opportunity to brush off any cobwebs before the FIA WEC season resumes in August. 

 

As the world adjusts to new routines in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans will pay its respects to those affected by Coronavirus with a special concert, held by the Princess Charlène of Monaco Foundation to collect donations for the research of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Pierre Ragues commented: “The Virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans promises to be a fun and exciting Esports event, bringing together our motorsport community for the first time since the pandemic took hold. We are approaching this event just as we would any race with all the professionalism for which Signatech Alpine Elf is known. We have the same car as the other LMP competitors, which means the opportunity lies in our hands to defend the team’s Le Mans honours in the virtual world. I have built up lots of sim experience over my years of racing, working closely with Ellip6 to use their simulators to prepare for events. I am familiar with rFactor but appreciate we will be competing against some highly talented sim racers, as well as WEC competitors, so it will be a very different challenge. We have some opportunities to prepare for the big weekend, and whatever happens it will be wonderful to be part of competition again for the first time in almost four months.”

 

Philippe Sinault, Team Principal Signatech Alpine Elf said: “We have explored different bridges between motorsport and Esport for more than 10 years and this Virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans is shaping up to be a truly exceptional event. As with any new project, we began pre-season preparations by reviewing our skills and analysing in detail the equipment required and the new challenges brought by this type of competition. Our quartet will benefit as well from the support of a team principal, an official operations engineer and a data engineer. They will take it turns to meet all the challenges of an event that will be just as physically and psychologically difficult as the real thing. From a competition perspective, we are approaching this race like all others with the ambition to do well since it has the potential to shape a part of the motorsport future while offering a dress rehearsal for the 24 Hours of Le Mans in September ... The difference is that we'll all be on an equal footing with the same equipment and the same ambitions at the start. May the best team win!”

 

10:00-22:00: Free Practice

10:00-22:00: Free Practice

 

10:00-17:00: Free Practice

18:40-18:55: Qualifying LMP2

15:00: Start of the Virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans