I ran a single qualifying session and amusingly set exactly the same lap time (down to the thousandth) as someone I had been communicating with about the Brickyard 400 on Twitter. I felt I probably could have done a faster time, but my qualifying time felt comfortable and I really wanted to not drive over the limits of my skill or the setup during the race. My time of 43.690 was enough to put me fifth on the grid anyway.

Starting on the inside was a definite advantage and I saw that quickly when I managed to start fifth and be third before the end of lap one. I stayed third until lap ten when Dwight Plesh got a little sideways and then eventually pitted under the next caution, allowing me to take second.

Leading the field into turn one at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

I restarted 18th on lap 44 and by lap 62 had worked my way back into the top-five, leading lap 66 due to drivers ahead of me fighting too hard for position and all losing out. I decided to pit on lap 68 and this put me 17th for another restart and back on-sequence with the leaders. I decided to pit again on lap 76, figuring that my off-sequence pitting and quick pace going through the field on previous runs meant I could win the race that way if I stuck with it.

The lap 76 restart from 16th-place was good and I quickly moved my way back to the front, leading by lap 91. I led until lap 100 when drivers with fresher tires started to come up behind me, and just like I had in the entire race I let them by as soon as they were close enough to do so. I comfortably ran in the top-five again though and eventually pitted on lap 104.

Chuck Chambliss hits the wall after contact from Tomas Klopp.

For the restart on lap 148 I ran in sixth-place and this is where the impatience of some of the drivers in the event became annoying… We had three restarts between laps 148 and the finish because people wrecked in the first turn on each green flag. I managed to pass two cars around the outside on the lap 148 restart (yes, on the outside), but never got a chance to get up to speed for either of the other two restarts, so remained stuck in fourth.

It became a terribly disappointing finish. I really hoped the race would not end that way, especially ending under a yellow flag.

Still, I suppose that’s racing… You win some, you lose some, and I can’t really say I am upset Michael Kundakcioglu got the win… He seemed like a really decent guy and was really pleased.

I am pleased, of course, to have had no incidents. Yes, that is right, I battled through the entire field multiple times and I fought for the lead, yet I emerged with no incidents and a massive gain of 1.02 on my safety rating. My fastest lap, on lap 116, was a 53.914.

I had ran a qualifying session and set a 1:31.015. Even though I had managed a 1:29 in testing with low fuel I figured I would stay with my time as that’s closer to my what my race pace would be.

I joined the race server at the scheduled time and after running a little in warm-up I sat relaxing before the race start. I was really, really excited and knew I had a good chance to finish well: So excited that when the lights lit up, I completely forgot what I was doing and shifted into first gear. A jump start was really not what I needed!

I got a good start (after my jump start) and when I pulled into the pit lane to serve my black flag penalty was still holding eighth-place. When I came out of the pits to start lap two I was last, but crossed the line to end the lap in 22nd.

Passing Dave Jinks for 20th-place on lap six.

I moved into 15th-place on lap nine after Adam Edwards and Omri Galili ran off track, while William Kabela gave way to me.

A lap later I was struggling to cleanly pass Olivier Raunier, and while I did eventually pass him David Osborne ran off the circuit, gifting me 12th-place ending lap 11.

By lap 30 some others in the race started to pit. I was running in a comfortable eighth-place, having moved here due to the gradual demise of those ahead of me. I honestly believed the last half of the race would follow a similar pattern and thought I’d be in with a really good chance of a podium. After all, I had no intention of pitting!

On lap 42 while running in seventh-place William Kabela let me by as I came up to lap him. I always like to thank people by typing “ty” (which means “Thank You”) and ending the lap was doing just that when I ran straight off the track! I lost a bunch of time to eighth-place Lasse Ryhanen and suffered my only incident point of the race so far as I recovered… Shortly into lap 43 I let the faster Ryhanen by, but rued the time I’d lost myself with that mistake!

My only incident against my safety rating in the entire event!

If I roughly estimate the time I lost due to the jump start and the off track excursion I still think I would have finished eighth where I did anyway, maybe seventh if I was really lucky. I can’t say I’m upset in the slightest at the result, a gain of 0.63 in safety rating is nothing to be sniffed at! The race was terrific fun and I really like it when I’ve had the time to put in so I at least know how to keep the car on the race track. Nothing makes more of a difference to my performance than time on the track.

So not only does this race spell out the dangers of being over-excited, it also clearly shows the dangers of ‘text chatting’ and driving. It’s also pretty amusing that when I crossed the line to finish I had enough fuel for another 44 laps as I’d forgotten to check how much fuel I’d need and started full! So… 100 laps next time?

The event itself turned out to be pretty exciting, with Riku Roiha making the pass for the lead in the final turn on the last lap. Here’s a quick video of that fantastic finish:

Legendary Lotus 79 F1 Car Is Featured For iRacing.com Historic British Grand Prix

Racing Game Enthusiasts Compete in Car That Took Andretti to World Championship and Revolutionized Motorsport

BEDFORD, MA (June 29, 2010) – In a celebration of the history of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone and in appreciation of the car that 32 years ago ushered in the ground-effect era of motorsport, more than a thousand members of iRacing.com are expected to participate in the iRacing.com Historic British Grand Prix. This group of race game enthusiasts and sim racers will compete in virtual versions of the Lotus 79, Mario Andretti’s mount for his 1978 Formula One World Championship and the first car feature a fully-effective design that generates downforce through underbody aerodynamics.

When it comes to Grand Prix racing, it doesn’t get any more historic than Silverstone. The modern World Championship was born on this former RAF bomber base, where Giuseppe Farina led a 1-2-3 sweep for Alfa Romeo, propelling him to the inaugural World Drivers Championship. It was also on Silverstone’s storied grounds, 28 years later, that Colin Chapman’s then-revolutionary Lotus 79 made its competition debut in the hands of Mario Andretti at the BRDC International Trophy non-championship event.

“Each year Silverstone pays homage to its grand prix history with at least two historic Formula One races,” said Divina Galica, iRacing.com’s director of partner relations. “As the eighth round in our 2010 World Tour, the iRacing.com Historic British Grand Prix allows our members from all over the world to join in paying tribute to this significant event in modern motorsport and a car that changed racing forever.”

Galica noted that unlike the real-world Silverstone historic races, which because of tight scheduling at the UK’s Formula One World Championship event must race on different weekends, iRacing’s virtual version is scheduled for the same weekend as this year’s real-world British Grand Prix.

The 68-lap race is scheduled for July 10 at 3 pm ET (19:00 GMT) and is open without additional charge to all iRacing.com members around the world. Grids for the 24-car race splits grids will be determined by qualifying time, with qualifying sessions beginning July 3 at 8 pm ET (00:00 GMT).

Lotus 79: Ground-Breaking Ground Effects

iRacing.com’s virtual version of the iRacing Lotus 79 was developed with the cooperation of Classic Team Lotus, which since 1992 has served as the Lotus Works for historic motorsport activity. Classic Team Lotus continues to maintain and operate Lotus F1 cars for owners around the world, and it preserves the Team Lotus archive and Works Collection of cars.

“Of all of the racing cars in Lotus’s long history, including others that have won world championships, few have had such an impact on the sport,” said Clive Chapman, managing director of Classic Team Lotus and the son of Lotus founder Colin Chapman. “The Lotus 78 was designed around the notion of underbody aerodynamics, but the 79 was the first car that fully exploited ground-effect principles. And that changed the face of racing. It was an amazing car for its time, and it remains an amazing car today. I’m pleased that iRacing has made it possible for people today to experience what it is like to drive the 79.”

Mario Andretti knows the Lotus 79 first-hand and his input helped iRacing’s vehicle dynamics engineers accurately develop the digital version of his championship-winning mount.

“Driving the Lotus 79 was one of the most satisfying experiences in my career as a race driver,” Andretti recalled. “The car was exceptionally responsive to different setups that we used to adapt to different circuits. Because I understood the dynamics of the car so well, I was able to achieve perfect balance with that car most of the time, which was very rare. I always looked forward to crawling into that cockpit. Of course that car also is significant in my life because I won the World Championship driving it.”

It was with the Lotus 79 that the brilliant Chapman realized the full potential of ground effect. With redesigned sidepods and front and rear suspension components repositioned so as not to impede the airstream’s entry or exit, the 79 generated 30% more downforce than the 78. Though it didn’t make its championship debut until the sixth race of the 1978 season, the Lotus 79 was miles ahead of the competition and with it Andretti dominated the rest of the year, winning the Drivers Championship and helping Lotus secure the Constructors Championship.

Williams FW 31

This past January iRacing.com and Williams F1 announced that with technical support from Williams F1, iRacing will build a virtual version of the 2009 AT&T Williams FW31. iRacing expects to make the car available to members of its internet-based global motorsport simulation service before the end of the year.

Before the event I had run two practices and one qualifying, setting a best lap of 2:18.411. After the server hiccup forced the race to be postponed for an hour I found myself able to improve in a second qualifying, setting a 2:17.232. It seemed obvious that because I was still gaining such huge amounts, I was leaving a lot of time on the table. Richard Towler (probably one of the best sim racers of all-time) happened to be in the same second qualifying and set a 2:09! Still, not too disappointed to be that far behind someone like him on a track this long and with a car and setup that felt so tough to turn.

iRacing.com Road America 200 gets under way!

After lapping consistently for a few laps I ran wide in turn one. I suffered no damage but dropped down to sixth, a position I would shortly gain back when Brian Harford left the track, gifting me fifth-place once again.

Damaged the left-front after running wide in turn one.

By lap 16 I had settled in and dropped back to 13th-place. My cars handling was very difficult to predict and I decided to pit, dropping down to 16th.

Attrition of those ahead of me had allowed me to climb to tenth by lap 33 and really at this stage I was delighted to still be within sight of a top-ten. Entering turn eight I was inspecting my fuel usage and completely missed my braking point… I slid into the turn and slammed the barrier, damaging the right-front and getting stuck in the barrier. I had to get a tow back to the pit lane and lost a whole lap on the leader, eventually rejoining the track in 12th.

Damaging the right-front in turn eight balanced out the handling.

After a small mistake on lap 38 which cost me a bit of time, I noticed fifth-place Riku Roiha coming up to lap me. I pulled off-track to let him by but immediately noticed I was capable of lapping the same pace as him so basically used him to try to improve my consistency. Later that lap I gained tenth-place when Michael Yoda retired.

On lap 48 I still had Riku right ahead of me and although I had given him plenty of room he reacted in a big way to a spin ahead of him. This produced a scary moment for me where I had to avoid smashing into Riku under braking. The next lap Greg Dukowitz, who was trying to cope with a damaged car, ran off-track in the final turn, allowing me to pass him and move into ninth, which is where I would finish.

The race took me two hours and almost four minutes. I had a whopping 18 incidents, most of them while trying to lap with my ill-handling car. However, because it was such a long race I only lost a minuscule 0.02 safety rating. My fastest lap came on lap three and was a 2:16.973. Before this race, I had never enjoyed the stock cars on the road courses, when the late model goes to Lime Rock I instantly balk at the prospect of racing it… This has probably changed my mind as by the end of the race I felt pretty comfortable out there and felt competitive. But, as always, too little – too late. I should probably try doing some testing, lots of it, before the next race.

Let’s face it, why do I race simulations? Because I enjoy it! What on earth is the point of not racing to avoid being in a wreck?! I’m a clean enough driver that I tend not to get the contact penalties others get on Superspeedways and if I get involved in a wreck I can then choose whether to quit the race and take the hit by not finishing, or I can then choose to run around purely for the safety rating. Besides, I can make back my losses from an SS race in a late model race or two… Well, maybe the ones I practice for, the ones I don’t practice for I make too many mistakes. ;)

The Talladega 499 is about to start!

I took the restart in 19th-place and ran up towards the front until lap 23 when it seemed like a wreck was about to happen. I pulled to the inside on the backstretch and let the field pass, rejoining and crossing the line next time by in 21st-place. Then in turn two one lap later a car in the lead group got on the apron and did very well to not wreck the entire lead pack: I like to think that my spider-senses tingled correctly and that this was the wreck I avoided by dropping back.

We soon created our own pack of cars led by Joe. We ran as that group until lap 49 when some cars started to pit who had not pitted during the first caution. I didn’t need to pit, so took a high line to avoid trouble but that obviously wasn’t enough because trouble managed to find me instead. As we exited the tri-oval to start lap 52, William Bennett (28) came straight up onto the banking after his pit stop and this caught Kenny Lopez (7) off guard, he came up and we made contact. Somehow I, probably due to the massive speed differences involved and the obvious lag that creates, didn’t take any damage – but did get a car contact penalty. I was now running in the top-five and had a 13-lap fuel advantage on most of the pack.

Running hard at Talladega.

It didn’t take long before I realized I would not be able to draft with anybody for a while: The couple of cars ahead of me were lined up and those behind were racing side by side, making them as slow as I was. I decided to run high and drag the brake until that group behind caught up with me and on lap 64 I had rejoined the group I entered the pits with.

By lap 69 we had settled down and were running in a line, we ran that way for 10 laps but then some in the group started to race again and on lap 84 we were losing tenths per lap to the couple of cars lined up by themselves ahead of us. This race had been extremely clean and I knew that if we were going to stay in contact with the lead group someone was going to have to take a lead and show the group how to lap faster: What’s funny is that this is probably why others in the group were racing, they all felt like they could go faster. Thankfully though, I turned out to be correct and after lapping in the 50.9-51.1 bracket I passed the group around the outside and immediately started to reel off consistent 50.7-50.8 laps with Christopher Shetzler (15) tucked in behind me.

On lap 95 the lead cars started to pit. At the time I was running 13th but as things cycled through I found myself leading by lap 97.

Christopher stuck close at Talladega.

I pitted on lap 102 and took the lap 105 restart from 10th place. It was a very messy restart at the front of the lead pack and the net result was a lot of lifting back in the pack. Things got sorted out though and the entire field sped around the 2.66-mile Talladega Superspeedway at neck-breaking speed for 31 green flag laps until an error was made by the 1st and 2nd-place cars, sending the yellow car of Brad Coleman for a wild ride on the apron of the race track. Incredibly, he held it together and the pack continued under green until lap 142 when Simon Trendell (32) hit Robert Woloschuk (21) in the rear in turn two, sending Robert down into 3rd-place Kyle Vesa (24) and all of them up into the wall.

Most of the pack got by unscathed, but all those directly involved in the wreck were eliminated. I was now in 8th-place and decided to pit on lap 143 and again to top off fuel on lap 144. Surprisingly yet again some of the leaders did not pit which again I thought was strange. I was now fuelled to the finish…

As it had been back on lap 105, the lap 147 restart was awful. Joe slowed (he said he missed a shift over the voice chat) and Bob Grooms (25) moved high to avoid. Seeing this unfold ahead of me I overreacted, clipped the apron, lost control, went up the racetrack, hit the wall and collected Jason Wright (5). I felt bad about Jason, but largely relieved that I hadn’t done this towards the front of the pack and taken out the entire field!

Hitting the turn two wall at Talladega.

What’s strange is that in the Talladega 312 on Friday I had wrecked early and had a terribly damaged car: I finished 7th. Today I wrecked on lap 147, still had a good car after the wreck, but finished 16th. The reason, of course, was because the Talladega 499 had a field of clean drivers who made their cars last to the finish. I was the first car not on the lead lap! We only had five cautions and ran green for all but 19 laps. That’s awesome.

I’m glad I didn’t lay back too much in this one and I’m glad I had fun out there while running without that fear. I was disappointed at my wreck for a moment but then I moved on and realized how much fun I was still having even though I wasn’t in a position to win anymore. I had 12 incidents (3 x car contact) and set my fastest lap after my wreck on lap 154. The race win went to Kevin West II (26).

Unfortunately I won’t make the Indy 500 iRacing World Tour event as fortunately I’ll actually be at Indianapolis working for iRacing! Hope to see some iRacing members at the event and hear about a successful iRacing Indy 500 when I get back.

My method of discovering NASCAR is probably quite unusual: I’m British and with abysmal TV coverage in Europe, I actually first saw the NASCAR logo on the box of a racing game that we all now know as NASCAR Racing 1 by Papyrus (largely the same people I now work with at iRacing). It’s amazing to think that a chance picking up of a box off a shelf can convert someone from a lifetime fan of F1 to someone who has been asked “how do you know that?!” by people who have actually worked for Cup teams. The first race I actually saw at Talladega was in 1996, before that I had simply read about the races in Autosport, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I still describe NASCAR racing in the same way I did back then: It’s a Marathon! You just have to be in a position to win at the end of the race.

So with that in mind coming into Talladega you have some tough decisions to make: Do you lay back and try to stay out of trouble, but risk getting too far behind if the race stays green? Do you stay in pack and figure that you probably wouldn’t be able to stay out of trouble anyway? Or, do you try to push your way to the front, hoping to stay ahead of the trouble? In the 312 and 499 races at Talladega this past weekend we saw every possible combination.

I had qualified with a 52.319s using the setup which Gregg Granello had posted in the forum. After a slight modification to the setup to help it stabilize through the tri-oval I figured it would work equally as well as a race setup and after joining the race – along with 652 others – found myself in the seventh iRating split of sixteen and in ninth-place in the starting order.

The iRacing Talladega 312 gets under way!

A very close call on lap seven.

Crossing the line in 16th for the lap eleven restart, I still wanted to hang around at the back, but when the high line opened up it looked far too tantalizing and like a moth to a light bulb I could not resist… I pulled high and over the next two laps went from 15th to eighth on the outside. Our progress was so good on the outside that it worried the low lane and someone came up to block as the leader of our lane went down to side-draft. Contact was made and this set off a chain reaction which wrecked my car among others – on lap 14 of 117.

Lap 14 - The big one.

I ran tenth starting the last lap (all positions were gained due to attrition) and frankly would have been delighted with that, but a last lap incident on the backstretch saw the first and second-place cars spin into the inside wall entering turn three as Paul Grimsley went by on the outside. Paul was also very lucky to hold on for the win when the person who inherited the lead into turn three also got spun. Paul’s incredible sideways drift along the apron and his ability to stay pointed in the right direction is what won him the race, and the last lap melee among the leaders allowed me to leapfrog them and move into seventh-place.

So, moral of the story for me in this one is that you probably shouldn’t give up on a car that still has four wheels and an engine – even if the wheels aren’t all pointing the same direction. After being wrecked on lap 14 I am absolutely delighted to come out of the event with a top-ten finish.

Bedford, MA (April 12, 2010) – With apologies to the poet T.S. Eliot, if you are a stock-car racing fan, “April is the coolest month” – both the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and NASCAR Nationwide Series visit Talladega Superspeedway, the fastest closed-circuit race track in the world. And this month, iRacing.com’s 2010 World Tour presents the iRacing community with its only double-header, races on April 23 & 24 honoring both of NASCAR’s top divisions. So every member of the iRacing community will have the chance to see for themselves the differences between the Sprint Cup and Nationwide cars with these full-length back-to-back races on the legendary Alabama high-banked oval.

“Based on the response we had to our Daytona 500 event in February, we expect a huge turnout of iRacers for Talladega,” said Kevin Bobbitt, iRacing.com’s director of marketing. “Many of NASCAR’s top drivers will be doing 811 miles of racing on the last weekend of April, and this is the chance for our members see what that’s like and to make back-to-back comparisons on how these two very different racecars perform on NASCAR’s fastest and often most exciting track.”

Bobbitt noted that the event is open to all iRacing.com members, regardless of license level, from the newest rookie to the most grizzled veteran. (iRacing.com is currently running a special promotion. New members can purchase a 3-month membership, which includes Talladega Superspeedway, for $25.00, which is 50% off the regular price. See www.iracing.com for complete details.)

Because the number of entries will be so large – as many as 2,000 of the service’s 20,000+ members are expected to compete – the field is broken down according to skill and experience level into an appropriate number of iterations of 34 cars each, with each iteration of the online race running on its own server.

“Someone can join iRacing.com the day before and still compete,” Bobbitt said. “They’ll be racing with other rookies, while our more experienced members will be racing with others of their skill level. Everyone has a chance to win his or her race, and to experience the thrill of 185 mile-per-hour pack racing on the fastest track in the world.”

The ‘Dega Double runs on Friday, April 23 (iRacing.com Talladega 312 for the iRacing Class B Impala SS in NASCAR Nationwide Series) and Saturday, April 24 (iRacing.com Talladega 499 for iRacing’s Class A Chevrolet Impala SS in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series configuration.)

Open practice sessions will for both races begin April 17th at (00:00 GMT). Qualifying for the iRacing.com Talladega 312 begins at 00:00 GMT, April 17th and runs at 45 minutes past the hour, every hour until race start on April 23rd. The race will begin at 7pm ET on Friday, April 23rd, (23:00 pm GMT). Qualifying for the iRacing.com Talladega 499 commences at 00:00 GMT, April 17th, beginning at 45 minutes past the hour, every hour until race starts at 11 am ET (15:00 GMT) on Saturday, April 24th.

At 2.66 miles in length and with 33-degree banking, Talladega Superspeedway is not just the fastest track in NASCAR – the all-time official Sprint Cup qualifying record stands at 212.809 mph, by Bill Elliott in 1987, before NASCAR technical regulations reduced horsepower and speed at Talladega and Daytona International Speedway but undoubtedly the fastest closed-circuit race track on the face of the globe.

Talladega holds the record for most leaders in a 500-mile race (26) and most lead changes as well (75 at the start/finish line), but on the last lap don’t ever bet against a driver named Earnhardt. Dale Sr. racked up an amazing ten Sprint Cup race wins, and Dale Jr. already has five on his resume, including a remarkable four-in-a-row streak in 2002-3.

One of the hardest things to accept in racing is not living up to your own beliefs on what you can do in a race car (whether it’s a virtual or real one). I’m sure Mark Webber had similar feelings after the Formula One Grand Prix in Australia and I’m sure there’s plenty of iRacers feeling similar things every week. Sure, I have my usual excuse that I didn’t have time to do any testing whatsoever, but most of the time I manage to put in a decent performance even when the first time I turn a wheel is when the race starts – so I don’t feel this fits. I also have a bit of a hate-hate relationship with Sebring – I think this fits more…

During my time in simracing I’ve had that same hate-hate relationship with a couple of other tracks, both of those became my absolute best tracks eventually: The Nurburgring in Grand Prix Legends (GPL) and Virginia International Raceway in iRacing. With both those tracks I felt I had an enemy, I felt the track was trying to beat me, I had a nemesis. With both these tracks I had terrible, terrible races many, many times.

It sounds like a cliché, I know, but what helped me to crack both these tracks was a lot of practice. I was in 11 private leagues at one time with GPL and I remember running a league race on a Saturday in the Ferrari Advanced Trainer (F2) car and feeling a ‘click’ in my brain, I won that race and then on Sunday – in an F1 Murasama (Honda RA273 – they couldn’t get licensing to name it) – dominated, doing consistent (and yes, I mean consistent) 8 minute 17 second laps at a time when the simracing ‘world record’ was an 8:10. I can still now – at least seven years after I last drove on it – tell you what direction and gear I used in every turn around the 174-turn 14.1-mile monster that was the 1967 Nurburgring F1 circuit.

I had the same thing back in 2008 when we first started to race the Skip Barber Formula 2000 at Virginia International Raceway prior to the public launch. I remember blogging about VIR being my nemesis and how many mistakes I used to make, I think I gave myself a complex! What was amazing to me at the time was how I kept going, kept trying and within a month I felt myself first improving, learning, then winning, and winning again the following season. So the thing that is hardest for me to accept is the time required to get from one stage to another – to have that patience to learn.

When you add Sebring to the Corvette C6R, you have probably one of the most difficult combinations in the history of simracing. The fact that in the 12 Hours of Sebring this combination has been raced for 12 hours rather than iRacing’s 120 minutes gives me an appreciation, just like pushing a 1967 F1 car around the Nurburgring did, for how immensely talented and courageous race drivers can be.

I’m going to say with absolute certainty that if you are frustrated, if you are doing badly at a track there’s only one person and one thing that can change that: You have to practice. Whenever you have a free five minutes join a practice session, launch a test session and just get yourself out onto that track you hate. Even if you have bad races somewhere and you feel it’s always someone else’s fault, wouldn’t it be great to be ahead of them when they wreck instead of behind them? By putting in that practice you can and will get better.

So, here comes the perfect example of how a race can turn out when you have done no practice whatsoever and dislike a track…

15 minutes before the race start I grabbed a setup from the forum, did a quick test and thought it felt pretty good. I went into a qualifying session and never set a clean lap in five recorded attempts. I also had eight incidents and lost 0.13 in safety rating. This left me quite frustrated going into the race server.

iRacing 120 Minutes of Sebring race start. I'm in the #28.

The third lap I had a half spin and dropped to 29th, grabbing a spot back to finish the lap in 28th. On lap four I was gently feeling my way around the circuit but in the final turn I got involved in someone else’s accident, causing minor damage to my car and spinning me out on the frontstretch – crossing the line in 27th.

A blocked track left me (blue car in distance) nowhere to go.

The #28 Corvette C6R spins off into the tires on lap four.

That is what racing is all about and really that’s what the iRating and safety rating are all about: You have to take your knocks and keep on racing! All in all that was a pretty frustrating race and one that I would not like to repeat without practice, but like I said above, it won’t have to be that way in the future, I am as determined to beat Sebring as I was with the Nurburgring and VIR.

Remember: Keep your good tracks close and your bad ones closer.

Anyway, here’s the video:

On Saturday 13th February, 2010 I was unable to run the 500, but got in a quick qualifying session for my race on the 20th just 15 minutes before the race session: I set a 48.075 and this would put me in 11th-place to start the race.

With 30 minutes of warm-up, it gave everybody plenty of time to check their setup, practice put stops, etc. I personally just practiced getting into and off pit road at speed and missed an opportunity to notice and correct that ‘terribly important’ thing once again…

The start of the iRacing Daytona 500.

We raced through a few cautions in the early laps, but things remained fairly constant for me until lap 15: It was the first time I’d really had to slam on the brake and when I did so it must have knocked my calibration off (recalibrating was the ‘terribly important’ thing I’d forgotten to do). At that point I was running 12th and just biding my time, but unknown to me the brake was now dragging and I hadn’t noticed the tiny sliver of red on the brake indicator.

Over the next 100 laps or so I just went backwards. At the time I believed I had lost an engine cylinder and was down on power, it wasn’t until about lap 114 that I realized what had happened, having finally noticed that the brake indicator was showing applied brakes.

Initially I just pulled back on the brake with my left foot while pushing on the throttle with my right, but after I began to experience cramping I managed to fix it for good on lap 164. However, during those last few laps I had had enormous fun: I normally wait until there’s ten laps remaining before I push really hard to get to the front, but knowing my position I used a combination of strategy, aggression and good luck to come back from two laps down to one, and come back from 22nd-place on lap 114 to 14th as the race ended.

Three-wide at Daytona.

So I ended with mixed emotions, just like everyone else: At one point I had resigned myself to just running for safety rating with a damaged engine, but I ended up having a lot of fun in some really tight racing. I had very few incidents (scraped the wall on lap 100, car contact on 190, the wreck on 194 and an off track on 198 while I got out of the way of the other cars on the final restart), but I still can’t help but think what might have happened had I not been trailing brake for half of the race!

My only real solace is that if this were real life, NASCAR would have probably forced me to start at the back anyway due to an ‘engine change’ in my PC… Starting back there I probably would have gotten involved in one of those early accidents and wouldn’t have had the fun I did during the race. Maybe next year I’ll be able to finish on the lead lap!