[MVRC] Mantium Virtual Racecar Challenge 2026 (Grand Prix Cars)

[AeroStarKnight]

Hi, thanks a lot for the clarification!

We’ll register the team as soon as possible. We are currently in the middle of our exam period , so we are planning to submit a first design around mid-July. Will it be ok?

Also, regarding the planned race dates, would it be possible to get some clarification on the expected calendar for the actual race rounds, excluding the prologue / pre-season tests?

Finally, we would like to clarify the development workflow. We usually use our own CAD software, 3DEXPERIENCE, and our own CFD tools, mainly Ansys Fluent. We also understand that the MVRC validation process uses specific tools, such as MantiumFLOW and MVRC Timing for lap-time evaluation. Will teams have access to these tools during development, or should we develop the car mainly using our own tools before submitting it for validation?

More generally, could you clarify what the expected development process is for the teams?

Thanks again for the information!

The Prologue is expected to be on 5th July. After which the first race is expected to be around 30th August.

07.06.2026: GP Monaco - Circuit de Monaco
05.07.2026: GP Great Britain - Silverstone
30.08.2026: GP Italy - Monza
18.10.2026: GP USA - Circuit of the Americas
29.11.2026: GP Brazil - Interlagos

This was the originally planned calendar. We missed the first round, and the second round is expected to be the Prologue. And then next dates will be race events. The season could carry forward to 2027 for rounds 4 and 5, but this is not confirmed yet.

About the workflow, I think most teams use different CAD software and MantiumFlow. You can find MantiumFlow and the Lap-time prediction by Max Taylor on the MVRC website in the "Software" section.

Wishing you the Best!

[erdosg]

We had a really fancy virtual launch party in Monaco a few weeks ago, and a picture just got leaked (thanks to some AI help ). How about other teams?
And also a question, should we start packing for a virtual preseason test next week?

[AeroStarKnight]

https://imgur.com/0Zt18No.jpeg
We had a really fancy virtual launch party in Monaco a few weeks ago, and a picture just got leaked (thanks to some AI help ). How about other teams?
And also a question, should we start packing for a virtual preseason test next week?

That's a very good Looking Car! Congratulations on your official Virtual Car Launch!
As for Aerostar Racing, I am planning to launch the car a day after the Prologue. And from my perspective, it's a Re-Debut since last year was dominated by DNFs. So here is the teaser for the Car Launch!



Also what track are we expecting for the Prologue? And will we have Monza COTA and Interlagos as the consecutive three rounds ?

Has anyone recieved any submission link so far ? Or is the Prologue postponed further ?

[AeroStarKnight]

Do we have any updates about the Prologue ?

[AeroStarKnight]

Hello Everyone!
I hope everyone is doing well. I guess that we are having another delay, sadly. I understand that the MVRC team is working really hard and is doing their best. I just want to say thank you to the MVRC team and assure that we are excited for the coming season. We understand that there could be multiple reasons for the delays and are willing to wait happily. We just hope that this season happens, even if it is late or with lesser number of races / events. Wishing the entire MVRC team the best.

Finally, it's time for the Car-reveal of a rookie team trying to Re-debut and make it's way into the mid-teams this season. After highly experimental, and a season marked by failures of the first prototype of AeroStar Racing the "G2V", I present to you the ALL NEW AeroStar Racing AR-01 !















I hope that the sponsors are happy with the way it looks and I hope it performs well this season. I would love to know everyone's thoughts, opinions and feedback. Thank You for the Opportunity!

[Ft5fTL]

Both yours and erdosg cars looks good. We definetly went up with the quality of the cars over the years. I hope we'll get going with the championship as soon as possible.

[erdosg]

Right now, I am not 100% sure about the calendar for 2026. I assume the minimum would be the second planned race will be the prologue and we have three races as planned for what was planned to be races 3-5. I still would rather like to have 5, so we might simply go into 2026. If it has to stay at three, there will be three very different tracks (high / low downforce and efficiency).

Just checking in if there are any update regarding the schedule and/or new MFlow release

[LVDH]

Hi guys,

so, I simply had negative time for MVRC the whole year so far. But now things are settled and it is time for me to get MVRC going.

I see that the car presentations this year are crazy good, so these things have to drive.

Checking the calendar, we will do the prologue on the 30.08.2026. The following two races will be as planned and the third one at some point after Christmas. So this year is a bit sad, as we will only have 3 races. I think the whole prologue idea is really good, esp. as we have so many new teams this year. Tomorrow, I will finally get back to MFlow development, so I hope a new version that addresses the pointed out issues will soon be available. Let me know if you have any new features, you would really like to see.

[CAEdevice]

Three races is good for me, provided that we will have 3 kind of tracks (low downforce, extreme downforce, maximum efficiency). From my point of wiew it's not worth to align with F1 real dates. Also the prologue (No points? Only 1 point for the winner just to avoid the team to sandbag?) is a good idea.

f I could change anything in MantiumFLOW, I would ask for a mesh that is not necessarily lighter, but faster to generate. I am not sure how much of a difference this would make, but since we will not be using active aerodynamic devices and this type of vehicle generally does not require significant rake values (and everyone will run as close to ground as possibile), I think the initial morphing phase could potentially be removed or skipped somehow, provided that it accounts for a meaningful portion of the processing time (not sure).

Another useful feature would be to generate a hash for the submitted ZIP file and a second hash for the final report, or for the folder containing the report generated by MantiumFLOW from the OpenFOAM results. This would make it possible to validate analyses performed locally, reduce the staff’s workload, and avoid unexpected discrepancies caused by re-running the same case on different systems. As far as I remember, this possibility had already been discussed and proposed, possibly by André himself, although I may not be recalling that correctly.

[LVDH]

Three races is good for me, provided that we will have 3 kind of tracks (low downforce, extreme downforce, maximum efficiency). From my point of wiew it's not worth to align with F1 real dates. Also the prologue (No points? Only 1 point for the winner just to avoid the team to sandbag?) is a good idea.

I like being aligned with F1 but reality is this year it will be difficult as I also think it would be nice to have different track characteristics. But right now, I would like to keep the initially proposed races 4 and 5 as they are. So for me the main question is what the final race would be. For the prologue I will probably go for Barcelona. Right now, the homepage is somehow refusing modifications to the calendar though.

f I could change anything in MantiumFLOW, I would ask for a mesh that is not necessarily lighter, but faster to generate. I am not sure how much of a difference this would make, but since we will not be using active aerodynamic devices and this type of vehicle generally does not require significant rake values (and everyone will run as close to ground as possibile), I think the initial morphing phase could potentially be removed or skipped somehow, provided that it accounts for a meaningful portion of the processing time (not sure).

The thing about mesh generation is that the time invested there gets repaid hundred times during solving. Also you specifically always have a nice model that is easier to mesh. The MVRC settings need to account for the "easy" to use CAD solutions. Morphing and so on only costs less than a second, so that can stay (it was requested heavily all these years as well). I am right now running some crazy AI stuff to hopefully improve the meshing phase though, so we might get something in the next days. It is actually looking promising.

Another useful feature would be to generate a hash for the submitted ZIP file and a second hash for the final report, or for the folder containing the report generated by MantiumFLOW from the OpenFOAM results. This would make it possible to validate analyses performed locally, reduce the staff’s workload, and avoid unexpected discrepancies caused by re-running the same case on different systems. As far as I remember, this possibility had already been discussed and proposed, possibly by André himself, although I may not be recalling that correctly.

This is a cool idea, I think it is out of the block chain world. But I have no idea on how I would be able to implement it into MFlow, so I kind of doubt that I once voiced this. But if you have instructions, I could follow, why not?

[CAEdevice]

Ok thanks, I would agree wirh any solution about the calendar.

Aboit the hashing proposal: it is only a cryptographic verification process unrelated to blockchain. For the input files, it verifies that the submitted geometry matches the one used for the local simulation; for MFlow-generated outputs, it also incorporates the concept of a digital signature to confirm their authenticity and integrity.