The second RAVENOL 3h race on Saturday, February 15, will mark the start of the second half of the season of the digital Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie. When almost five dozen cars take up the race over the 180-minute distance in the virtual Green Hell at 1 p.m. sharp, excitement is guaranteed, as the decision in the championship is drawing closer. A preliminary decision will not be made, because there are no strike results in the winter season 2024/2025. The digital race day will be livestreamed from 11:30 a.m. on VLN.de.
In the overall standings, two teams from SCHERER eSPORT are in the lead. The #116 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup and the #269 Renault Clio have each notched up two class wins. William Chadwick and Luca Alpert won alongside regular driver Raphael Rennhofer in the 911, while Sven Winter and Michael Teusch triumphed twice in the Clio.
As in the real ADAC Nürburgring Langstrecke-Serie, the DNLS features multi-class action. New this season is the Clio SP3 class. It forms the counterpart to the significantly faster and more spectacular GT3 cars in the SP9. And even though the power is much lower – in the class of compact sports cars from France, exciting racing is on offer. “We always have to keep an eye on the mirrors from the second lap onwards when we are on the D-Zug and the GT3 pack flies past us. Above all, we have to make sure that we still take the momentum with us everywhere,” says championship leader Teusch. ”We reach our top speed of around 215 km/h in the Fuchsröhre. We don't have a chance of getting up to that speed on the Döttinger Höhe. The Clio lacks a bit of power at the top end. Plus, we're running without ABS, which means that the rear wheels tend to lock up. That makes driving the Clio extremely demanding, but it's always a lot of fun.”
BS+COMPETITION leads the field in the SP9 class. European Truck Racing Champion Norbi Kiss and Felix Quirmbach finished second in the Mercedes-AMG GT3's digital counterpart at the season opener and went on to win the second race on February 1. AMG Team Apex Racing is in second place – with a respectable seven-point gap. Gordie Mutch has taken a liking to DNLS during his most recent guest start. The Briton, who won the 2022 Praga Cup and finished tenth in the 2024 British GT4 Championship, is replacing Elias Seppänen as a real driver at Apex Racing. Sebastian Øgaard, a young talent, is taking his place in the simulator for Pole Promotion Esports, the team around DTM champion René Rast and Alexey Nesov. The Dane has twice finished on the podium in the GTWC Silver Cup in 2024. After a break of one race, Tim Heinemann returns to the virtual cockpit of the Porsche 911 GT3 R of Team Nitro x Falken. The 27-year-old sim racing pro made his DTM debut in 2023 and last year, with Falken Motorsports, claimed victory in the real-life ADAC Nürburgring Langstrecke-Serie.
Falken Simracing leads the championship in the GT4 class SP10. Lucas U. Müller and Benedikt Hitz drove the BMW M4 GT4 to third and first place, and with a one-point lead, they are just ahead of SimRC. In the Mercedes-AMG GT4, Corentin Guinez and Marvi Strehl finished second twice.
The second RAVENOL 3-hour race is the third of four rounds in the 2024/2025 winter season. NLS presenters Patrick Simon and Olli Martini will open the livestream on VLN.de on Saturday at 11:45 am from the virtual studio at the Nürburgring with a pre-show and a summary of the practice session. The virtual starting lights will turn green at 1 p.m. for the three-hour race.
The livestream can be accessed here.