Formula E driver cheated in virtual race by enabling sim driver

Daniel Abt, driver of Audi’s Formula E team, has been disqualified from recent virtual Formula E races and has to pay 10,000 euros to charity. He gets that penalty because he let a professional sim racer take his place during a virtual race on Saturday.

According to The-Race.com, Abt has admitted that not he, but sim racer Lorenz Hoerzing drove the virtual Audi in the Formula E Race at Home Challenge last Saturday. During the race, other drivers already suspected that Abt was not behind the wheel himself. ‘Abt’ qualified second, led the race for a while and eventually took third place. In previous virtual races Abt achieved a maximum of fifteenth finish and in qualifying he did not go further than ninth place.

All drivers can be seen during the race via a Zoom feed, but Abt’s image did not clearly show who was behind the wheel. The face was hidden behind a microphone. The organization of the virtual race reportedly checked the IP addresses after the suspicions and concluded that Abt could not be the racer.

Hoerzing also participated in the virtual Formula E races, but in the class for e-sportsmen, which is run parallel to the class for real drivers. All official Formula E drivers participate in the virtual versions of the race, unlike Formula 1. The virtual races are held in racing simulator rFactor 2.

Abbot admitted that he was not driving himself and that Hoerzing had taken his place. He has apologized and says he didn’t take the race as seriously as he should. As a penalty, the driver is disqualified from the last race and his points from previous races are also taken away. He also has to make a ‘mandatory donation’ of 10,000 euros to a good cause. Hoerzing has been completely disqualified from further participation in virtual Formula E races.