It’s a challenging time for many of us at the moment. No riding motorcycles for pleasure or racing to watch. Well, the virtual world and MotoGP stars are at least trying to alleviate the second problem, as you can now watch the MotoGP Virtual Race 2.
The eSports series pits 10 MotoGP stars against each other in a virtual race. And with the top five from the first round returning, including winner Alex Marquez, his brother Marc Marquez, Maverick Vinales, Fabio Quatararo and Francesco Bagnaia, there were five new challenges joining.
Valentino Rossi takes part for the first time, alongside Danilo Petrucci, Michele Pirro, Tito Rabat, and Takaaki Nakagami. But have Petrucci and Pirro benefitted from any tips after Ducati signed a pro eSports racer for 2020? You’ll have to watch below to find out how they did at the Red Bull Ring in Austria.
It’s not quite the same as watching real MotoGP racing. But the riders did their best to include crashes and a last lap battle.
And it’s also entertaining to have the home webcams showing how seriously each racer is taking the #StayAtHomeGP, although none matched the lean angles of Joan Mir during the first race.
Car racers who regularly take part in sim racing often say that although the experience is somewhat different from reality due to the lack of danger, it does help to keep a competitive racing instinct, along with helping track knowledge (most serious games use laser scans of tracks to capture every bump and camber change).
Other MotoGP and professional motorcycle racers are also offering the chance to race against them online, including Jake Dixon and others. So it’s worth checking out which bike game your favourite riders might be playing for the chance to beat them. Even if it’s a virtual victory…
If you fancy giving it a go, the new edition of the MotoGP game franchise, MotoGP 20, is released on April 23rd. PC gamers can add it to their Steam wishlist now, and Xbox owners can pre-order it via the Microsoft store.
It’s also coming out for the PS4 and Nintendo Switch, but pre-orders are apparently limited to physical copies from Game or Amazon, etc.
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