Frigate Race

Frigates are among the fastest and most agile ships in the universe. For this reason they are popular ships used in competitive racing. Racing has taken on many different formats over the years. Typically a race will consist of a starting position, a finish and one or more obstacles which must be completed during the race. The Interstellar Racing Championship is among the most influential organizations in the racing business, active since 109 and having completed its 7th season. Recently other organizations have started gaining popularity, including the Sub-warp Racing Venture now in its 4th season.

Formats

Here is a short outline of various racing formats that have been or are in use.

Warp Race

The warp-race usually starts in one solar system, either in space or docked in a station, then progresses through a number of solar systems towards a finishing system or station. On the way there may be objectives like sending a specific message to a marshal, finding or looting an object from a container in space or evading gate camps.

Typically racers will focus on having skills and fitting modules that increase agility in order to align for warp faster, but there is also potential for incorporating combat into this format, as racers will often come together around checkpoints where they are required to loot something or change course.

Sub-warp Race

In a sub-warp race contestants do not warp from place to place. Instead a course is laid out which is designed to be flown at normal speeds. This format is more focused on testing a contestant's reflexes and familiarity with their ship's systems and agility.

A sub-warp race will often feature checkpoints created by anchoring cans in space some distance apart to represent the turns a racer must perform before crossing the finish line. In some variations a racer must manually maneuver around these checkpoints, whereas in other races it may suffice to approach each checkpoint in sequence using the ship's navigation systems.

Drag Race

A drag race is a type of sub-warp race which does not feature any turns or obstacles. Instead the course consists of a start and a finish, challenging the racers' skill(books) and fittings as opposed to experience and reflexes. The SRV format drag race did feature a single 180 degree turn, so timing did play a role. The drag race format is less popular as it promotes min-maxing behavior and tends to result in a one-sided outcome where the fastest ship wins each time.

Hybrid Racing

A less frequent occurrence is the mixing of different types of racing. A drag race may involve one or more manually flown obstacles, such as coming about 180 degrees at a half-way point and going back to the start, or a warp race might have a sub-warp leg at one of its waypoints.

Ships

Popular racing ships are the tier 1 frigates, Executioner, Condor, Atron and Slasher, which are lighter and more agile than their bigger siblings, with an exception of the Vigil which gives a bonus to base speed, increasing max velocity as well as freeing low power module slots for agility modules. Interceptors also tend to be popular in the SRV format when they are allowed.

When combat is involved or expected during the race, a wider variety of ships is seen, especially the assault-style hulls like the Merlin and Rifter among others.

Non-frigate Racing

Frigates aren't the only ships to be raced around the galaxy. Although popular for their excellent speed and agility, there have been occurrences of other ship classes racing each other. Including but not limited to:

The Great Rubber Duck Race A rookie ship warp-race going through low sec that culminated in a dramatic rush through the infamous Rancer stargate into high sec where contestants scrambled to grab prize tickets out of a number of containers.

The Night's Dawn Tractor Pull Rally A high sec event where pilots pitted their industrial ships against each other in a furious waypoint pick-up warp-race. Organised by Eve Radios own DJ Sam.