Mentioned in this article
- The F1 New Balance Esports Series will begin its regional China Championship beginning in August.
- The winner and runner-up of the China Championship will be entered in the 2020 F1 Esports Pro Draft for the next season.
- The 2019 F1 New Balance Esports Series has a $500K USD prize pool and an expanded events schedule, and also introduces Ferrari as an official team.
Formula One (F1) and Juss Intellisport will begin the F1 New Balance 
Esports Series China Championship in August, with the new regional competition set to last through the end of 2019.
The China Championship is an offshoot of the current F1 New Balance Esports Series for Codemasters’ F1 2019 game, and will have qualifying events for the Eastern, Northern, Southern, and Midwestern regions of China. Following the Regional Finals, the 100 top racers will proceed to a Grand Finals event.
Only the winner and runner-up of the China Championship Grand Finals will make it to the 2020 F1 Esports Pro Draft, where the 10 official Formula One teams will choose new drivers to represent them for next season. A warm-up qualifying event will be held from July 29 to August 3 at the CapitaMall LuOne in Shanghai, with a China Championship kick-off event to be held there on August 4.
“We are thrilled to be launching the F1 Esports Series China Championship, our first-ever regional qualification championship, only two years after our entry into the burgeoning world of esports,” said F1 head of growth and esports, Julian Tan, in a release. “China is an incredibly important market to Formula One, and we believe there is massive potential to grow the passion for motorsport and cultivate the love for F1 as a sport in this region through F1 Esports, particularly amongst our next generation of fans. We want to engage with them in new and innovative ways, and esports is a powerful tool to do that. We cannot wait to meet our first-ever Chinese F1 Esports qualifiers and welcome them to our 2020 Pro Draft.”
Related Article: Expanded F1 New Balance Esports Series Has $500K Prize Pool
The 2019 F1 New Balance Esports Series has a $500K USD prize pool and an expanded events schedule over the 2018 season, and welcomes Ferrari to complete the set of all 10 F1 teams. The China Championship was first announced in April alongside 2019 season details, and a warm-up event was held at the Formula One Heineken Chinese Grand Prix 2019 at the Shanghai International Circuit.
Juss Intellisport Co. Ltd. is part of a Chinese state-owned enterprise called Shanghai Jiushi Group, which also owns the Shanghai International Circuit and has a Juss Event subsidiary that operates the April F1 race. In short, the state has a hand in both China’s F1 race and F1 esports endeavors.
