Drivers and teams,

In light of the results of the first two rounds, we have decided to alter the restriction settings in both classes for the remainder of the season. In order to bring the FZR and XRR into closer competition in both classes, we are putting in place the following new restrictions:

GT1: FZR + 27kg, XRR unrestricted, FXR unrestricted
GT2: FZR 20%, FXR 23%, XRR 24% + 10kg

We feel that these figures will bring the two top cars closer in terms of competitiveness over the remaining races.

NOTE: Teams will have until their first qualifying session for Round 3 to choose a new car if they so desire. As always, teams may skip Q1 if they need more time to decide/prepare. If a team changes car model, rulebook-correct qualifying skins are desired but not required for this round. However, the rulebook-correct race skin will still be required by the usual deadline (driver confirmation).

Thanks for your input and help with this issue.

-MoE Admins

In Friday's Q2 session My3id cemented its GT1 pole position with an improved lap of 2:13.76, making them the only team to crack the 2:13 barrier. Jesse Nieminen of F1RST Racing also bettered his Q1 time to retain 2nd spot, though by only .02 seconds to 2:14.12. Andy Carey of nfinity eSports made the best of the team's sole qualifying session, taking a strong third place on the grid with a 2:14.15, just three thousandths behind Nieminen. Heikki Jaakkola also did great things with his team's 30 minutes, beating out CoRe Racing for 4th. CoRe had a disastrous Q2, 12th in session after repeated timeouts by Nolan Scott. Phil Diaz's 2:14.35 stood for 5th best overall in the combined sessions. Top FZR honors went to Team Inferno, who placed 8th on the final grid with a 2:14.54 by Martin Krönke.

Team Sirius decided to rest on their laurels in GT2, sitting out the session after Lado Gluscevic set a blistering 2:21.20 in Q1. Sonicrealms Racing, 2nd in the first session, also sat out. Neither of these teams were challenged for their front row positions, as the fastest car in Q2 was the My3id Gaming FZR driven by Karolis Kliaudaitis. Kliaudaitis recorded a 2:21.62 to take 3rd in class on the final grid. Máté Mickiewicz picked up 4th for iNFiNiTY*SkillS in their sole qualifying appearance with a 2:22.05, and Ariel Chiodini's 2:22.06 for CoRe Racing made good on the team's decision to switch to FZR, placing them 5th. The sole XRR in the grid, driven by Patrick Kubinji for !cewolves Racing Team, took 8th on the final grid with a 2:22.34.

Q2 results can be found here, while the full final grid is here.

The green flag drops for the 12 Hours of Kyoto GP Long just a few minutes after 12:00 UTC today, October 10th. Join Jonathan Palmer, Michael Passingham, and newcomer to the booth Chris Wilkinson for live flag-to-flag coverage at MultiBC Stream III!

The first qualifying session of the Masters of Endurance 2009-2010 Season took place this past Sunday at Kyoto GP Long. The session marked the first official test of the new "Boothy chicane," designed to reconfigure the original KY3 oval chicane from a dangerous, unpredictable, and exploitable full-throttle kink into a 60mph 90-degree turn. Remarkably, nearly all drivers navigated the layout successfully, with only two teams' fast laps being invalidated by contact with poles. Compared to last year's tally, this is a marked improvement.

In GT1, as expected the XRRs were dominant. My3id Gaming's Hugo Luis took the provisional pole with a lap of 2:14.08, followed closely by F1RST Racing's Jesse Nieminen at 2:14.14. Phil Diaz of CoRe Racing took third with a 2:14.35. The highest-placed FZR in the first qualifying session was Adrian Suszynski's Conquest Racing machine, fifth of the nine session qualifiers with a 2:14.63. However, perennial favorites #low-racing have yet to take to the track in their FZR.

The GT2 grid was the polar opposite, with FZRs taking the top eight spots in the first session. Lado Gluscevic of new series entrant Team Sirius sits on the provisional pole with a 2:21.20, nearly three tenths of a second faster than Mark Bunby's second-quick time for Sonicrealms Racing. Third is Niki Djakovic of My3id Gaming, who was almost another half second off Bunby's time. The fastest XRR was driven by Ariel Chiodini of CoRe Racing, ninth with a lap of 2:22.90.

Q2 will take place this Friday the 9th starting at 19:00 UTC. Traditionally, the fastest times are set in this final session, as teams scramble for the best position possible.

Full Q1 results can be found here.

Masters of Endurance is happy to announce that we have renewed our agreement with our fabulous broadcaster, MultiBC, to broadcast the entirety of Masters of Endurance 2009-2010. All of our six rounds this season will be broadcast live, in their entirety, and available for download after the fact.

As in last season's broadcasts, you can expect our experienced team of commentators including Michael Passingham, Jonathan Palmer, and Ben Keough, as well as such relative newcomers as Chris Wilkinson. Mr. Palmer will be working hard to produce qualifying recaps, track introductions, and driver interviews throughout the season.

Thanks again to MultiBC for their fantastic service and their commitment to LFS broadcasting!

Continuing on from the tradition of previous seasons, the schedule for the 2009-2010 Masters of Endurance season has been released. Due to the impending release of the Rockingham circuit in an upcoming patch, and to a general sense that the Blackwood circuit is not appropriate for mixed-class GTR racing, the fifth round of the season has been left open and will be filled as described below. The schedule is as follows:

Round 1: 12 Hours of Kyoto GP Long†: October 10th, 12:00 UTC
Round 2: 6 Hours of South City Long: November 7th, 14:00 UTC
Round 3: 6 Hours of Westhill International: December 5th, 14:00 UTC
Round 4: 24 Hours of Aston GP: January 16th, 16:00 UTC
Round 5: 6 Hours of *: February 13th, 14:00 UTC
Round 6: 6 Hours of Kyoto National: March 13th, 14:00 UTC

- GT1 qualifying for each event will take place the Sunday and Friday before the event, at 19:00 UTC.
- GT2 qualifying for each event will take place the Sunday and Friday before the event, at 19:40 UTC.
- Each qualifying session for each class will be 30 minutes long.


†: For this race weekend the series will use what has come to be termed the "Boothy chicane," which reconfigures the infamous Kyoto oval chicane into a 90-degree, 60mph, second-gear corner.
*: Will based on either:
a) A new track release per patch, or...
b) A vote among the teams participating in the series, choosing from a list of admin-provided options (in the case that a) is not an option).

As in previous seasons, the 24-hour event at Aston Grand Prix will be worth double-points. New to this season, the season-opening 12-hour event at Kyoto Grand Prix Long will be worth 1.5x points, similarly reflecting its 1.5x length.

Masters of Endurance is pleased to announce the list of accepted teams for the 2009-2010 season. Our grid this year is our strongest yet, and we expect stiff competition in both classes throughout the entire season.

In past seasons, MoE has used 29 teams due to the 30-car restriction at South City Long. This season, we have invited 30 teams to participate, and will simply allow the polesitter to lead the field around at South City. This will require some cooperation from the driver of the polesitting car, but we believe it is doable, and worth doing to get another qualified team into the field.

You may also note that this season's GT2 grid is larger than last season's, and consequently the GT1 grid is smaller. This is simply due to a larger interest in GT2 this season compared to seasons past. We trust that our GT1 teams, skilled as they are, will be able to navigate the increased traffic without difficulty.

Without further ado, here are the accepted teams!

GT1:
01 F1RST Racing
02 #low-racing
03 nfinity eSports
04 spdoRacing
05 My3id Gaming
06 n1Racing
07 Team Inferno
08 CoRe Racing
09 Speed Core Racing Team
10 The Danish Racing Team
11 ConeDodgers Racing
12 Sonicrealms Racing
13 Conquest Racing
14 Warbirds Team
15 Alternative.AXLE3D

GT2:
32 spdoRacing
33 AMT Sim Racing Team
34 Infinity Skills
35 Sonicrealms Racing
36 CoRe Racing
37 nfinity eSports
38 LFSLA
39 My3id Gaming
40 Team Inferno
41 Team Sirius
42 Estonian Endurance Racers
43 Fluid Racing
44 E-Team
45 RAPTOR-RACING
46 !cewolves Racing Team

#05, #16, #17, and #37 have receive +15s penalties to make up the difference from a DT to a SG for their skin penalties as applied during the race. Result wise this made My3id drop from 5th to 6th position in the final results for Kyoto National.

Round 6 Results: 6 Hours of Kyoto National and total results for Masters of Endurance 2008/2009

Final Standings Masters of Endurance season 2008/2009

GT1
F1RST Racing GT1 managed to grasp the title of Masters of Endurance GT1 Champions for the 2008/2009 Season. After an unfortunate disconnect by #low-racing' driver J.Scheuerle early in the race, F1RST racing only had to made sure that they stayed out of trouble. Despite a Drive Through after to a controversial incident with the Spdo Racing GT1 car, they managed to finish second and claim the overall title. The race was won by Spdo Racing GT1 claiming their first Masters of Endurance victory allowing them to jump two positions in the overall championship: from 6th to 4th. #low-Racing on the other hand drove a very impressive race after their unfortunate disconnect and were able to claim the last spot on the podium. For the second year in a row they finish second in the overall class. Third place in the championship goes to Mercury Racing Team GT1, finishing 4th this race.

Top 3 GT1 Class Season 2008/2009
1 #03 - GT1 - F1RST Racing GT1
2 #02 - GT1 - #low-racing
3 #01 - GT1 - Mercury Racing Team GT1

GT2
While the Masters of Endurance GT2 title was claimed by F1RST Racing GT2 in round 5, and second position was not really in danger for Spdo Racing GT2, the race for the final 3rd overall position was still a fierce battle: Infinity Skills GT2, AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team and Sonicrealms Racing all were competing to claim third place in the overall championship.
With Infinity Skills suffering from a disconnect and a penalty due to driving with the wrong skin after reconnect, the race was on between Sonicrealms Racing and AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team: Sonicrealms Racing had to make up 10 points to reclaim the position it lost to AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team last race.
With last season overall GT2 winners Core Racing GT2 winning the final race of the season, it was Sonicrealms Racing who managed to finish 2nd in class and setting the bar for AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team to not loose too much ground. This season champion F1RST Racing GT2 managed to grap 3rd place - their lowest finishing position for this season. AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team finished 4th in class ensuring they have 1 point overlap on Sonicrealms Racing and managed to overtake Infinity Skills GT2 for third place in the overall standings.
Finally Pro'drive strong performance in this final race allowed them to the hand over the last place in the overall standings to Xfushion GT2.

Top 3 GT2 Class Season 2008/2009
1 #35 - GT2 - F1RST Racing GT2
2 #34 - GT2 - spdoRacing GT2
3 #40 - GT2 - AutoMotoTrke.net Sim Racing Team

Finally Masters of Endurance would like to thank all people involved in the creation and execution of its format:

Our Sponsors
Race server provided by:

500 Servers

Broadcast provided by:

http://www.multibc.de/Streamstarter/

File hosting provided by:

http://www.darcyf1.com/

Our Series Directors:
P. Kempermann (Hoellsen)
B. Keough (DeadWolfBones)
A. Terrahe (AppiePils)

Our series admins
J. Grüner (three_jump)
Z. Iqbal (r4ptor)
A. Leggate (amp88)

Our Series Marshals
J. Laurila (Jonesy_)
Virgílio Gruppelaar (gil07)

Our Technical Consultants
H. van Arem (FireFox86) (Tracker assistance)
K. Burns (burnsy1882) (GT2 laptime addon)
C. Roescher (Kaspur) (Website creation/Tracker)

Our Graphic Designer
J. Ziarko (justinziarko)

Our commentators
Michael Passingham (Mp3 Astra)
Jonathan Palmer (dekojester)

Our previous host:
Marc Grosser (MarcIone)

And of course all participating teams, viewers, interviewed people and others involved in making this another spectacular and successful season.