Olympic Esports Series 2023: Kylian Drumont wins Gran Turismo 7 motor sport event with perfect strategy

France's Kylian Drumont is the inaugural winner of the motor sport Gran Turismo 7 event at the finals of the Olympic Esports Series 2023 after a thrilling 42-lap race around the Deep Forest Raceway.

Drumont, who suffered a technical issue that cut short his qualifying run forcing a redo, qualified in second. But he bade his time behind eventual pole-sitter Angel Inostroza of Chile before making the decisive move late in the race after nailing his race strategy.

Inostroza had opted to start on soft tyres, the quickest – but least durable – of the three tyre choices available to the players. Meanwhile, Drumont and Great Britain's Will Murdoch, who started third, both began on mediums.

The Chilean quickly opened up a sizeable lead, before coming in to pit at the end of lap 11 for medium tyres with a four-second lead on Drumont. Drumont, on the more durable mediums, lasted three further laps in his opening stint before pitting, and despite returning to track over five seconds behind Inostroza did not panic.

Murdoch, meanwhile, was driving a clean race in third, staying out of trouble including multiple incidents further down the field.

Things really heated up after the second stops, with Inostroza pitting from the lead on lap 27 and staying on mediums. However, he came back out onto track in the middle of traffic, and in an attempt to get past Kaj de Bruin was forced wide and tapped the barriers, losing crucial time.

Drumont, meanwhile, pitted on lap 30 for softs, aiming to complete the final 12 laps on the fastest tyre. While he still found himself behind Inostroza upon rejoining the race, the Frenchman quickly ate into the gap.

Out front, José Serrano – running a one-stop medium to hard strategy – was holding Inostroza behind him, and things came to a head on lap 35 when the three drivers found themselves three-wide going into turn one.

Drumont tapped Inostroza while getting past, with the Chilean falling behind Serrano, although the race stewards decided the contact had been a racing incident.

From there, the Frenchman was unimpeded as he raced away to the win. However, Inostroza continued to feel the effects of the battle, and although he managed to get past the slow Serrano eventually found himself overtaken for second by Murdoch at turn one on the penultimate lap.

Drumont's winning time was 54 minutes 4.181 seconds, finishing 5.624 seconds ahead of Murdoch with Inostroza coming home nearly eight seconds behind the winner.

"I saw in practice the softs in the first stint was useless, the tyre wear was so bad," Drumont explained of his strategy. "I saw Angel start on softs, and I thought it was perfect for me. I started two stints on medium, and I knew in the last stint the softs was the best.

"I think I did a good strategy for the race."