From RaceRoom to the Race Of Champions
A RaceRoom driver against Juan Pablo Montoya, in a real racecar, in a stadium? In front of cameras and spectators? That sounds crazy, but it’s true for Alexander Dornieden. The 23 years old German won the Esports WTCC Championship on RaceRoom in an exciting final.
Now he gets the oppurtunity to show his talent in a real racecar, in a very special event. On February 2nd and 3rd, the Race Of Champions is taking place in Saudi-Arabia, in Riyadh’s King Fahad International Stadium. This year, simracers have been invited for the first time, to follow the footsteps of Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel.
First of all, the simracers will drive against each other in the eROC, in the simulator and in real cars. The best placed simracer will move up to the main event to challenge pros such as Juan Pablo Montoya, Petter Solberg, Tom Kristensen or David Coulthard, in real racing cars of course.
Alexander Dornieden (Champion Esports WTCC 2017): It is still hard to believe the oppurtunies that RaceRoom has provided for me in the last two years. I just picked up the game because I wanted to play a racing game with my cousin for fun. Then I saw that there are official tournaments, with live streams. This was awesome for me and it sparked my competitive drive, it pushed me to improve on the game. But I would have never expected that it develops into this direction. Only two years later I had the chance to drive a real AMG Mercedes on a race track. Only because of simracing. This was incredible, I thought it cannot be beaten, and now it gets even better with the event in Riyadh. It’s only because of the Esports WTCC and RaceRoom that I have this oppurtunity. I am excited and honoured to be driving in such a prestigous race, and it’s great to see how simracing and motorsports are merging more and more – and the chances it provides for every regular racing fan.
Alexander Dornieden isn’t even the only RaceRoom driver in the event. Kévin Leaune has won a race in the Esports WTCC, and he has been invited too, for winning titles on another racing game.
To ensure that Alexander has the best preparation, he can count on the support of the RaceRoom VIP drivers; Real racing drivers that use RaceRoom for preparation and for fun. Audi TT-Champion Philip Ellis offered his help as well as WTCC race winner Yann Ehrlacher. Additionally, Alexander already won a driver training with high performance sportscars in our Mercedes-AMG eRacing competition in 2016, which will come in handy for the Race Of Champions.
Robert Wiesenmüller (RaceRoom Competition-Manager): It’s a great chance for Alexander and Kévin, and it also shows the positive development in simracing. Real racing series see us as a part of motorsports now, respect the competition and simracers turn into athletes that can compete in real cars. And at RaceRoom, we are especially proud that two drivers from our community have been invited – it shows the prestige and level of our competitions.
If you also want to improve on RaceRoom to get a chance like this one day, make sure to keep on playing RaceRoom and always check out our Competitions! A lot of interesting formats will follow this year.