Archive for the ‘Indianapolis Oval’ Category

2011 iRacing Indy 500 Race Report

Sunday, May 29th, 2011

This weekend saw the second running of the iRacing Indy 500, a race I was very eager to finish following last years DNF after just 17 laps. By way of coincidence, I managed to achieve almost exactly the same qualifying performance as last year. Last year I qualified 193rd of 636 competitors. This year was also 193rd of 638! Both a similar number of qualifiers, as well as exactly the same qualifying spot!

A final total of 975 racers took to the track and my race split was the fourth race split, as determined by qualifying time. As always, my race objective was to make it to lap 200 and see where things lined up, and stay at the back of the field if I had to. I started the race from the pit lane and managed to avoid a few of the early wrecks as things got settled out amongst the field.

Unfortunately I didn’t come close to finishing (yet again!) and again it was through no fault of my own – on lap 31 two cars collided down low and as I slowed and moved high to drive past one car slid up to the highline and collided with me, sending me into the wall with race ending damage.

Looking through the other splits it seems that most races have less than ten finishers at the end, so I suppose a winning strategy next year is to sit in the garage for 100 laps to pass before taking to the field. That won’t get me a win, but a top 10 is almost guaranteed!

2011 iRacing.com Indy 500 results (iRacing members only!)



Started :
23rd of 32
Finished : 25th DNF, 169 laps down, 27 points (6 incident pts)
iRating : -81
Safety Rating : A/4.99 (no change)

The next race in the iRacing World Tour is the Michigan 400 (NASCAR Sprint Cup) on June 18th.

The Second Annual iRacing Indy 500

Tuesday, May 24th, 2011

This weekend brings the next event in the 2011 iRacing World Tour, with the second running of the iRacing Indy 500 event. Last years event (my race report is here) saw a combined total of 759 racers take to the grid for a full length virtual recreation of this prestigious event.

This time last year the iRacing Indy 500 was the very first World Tour event where the grids would be set by qualifying speed alone (not iRating as per usual). This has since been adopted as the standard way of assigning race grids in World Tour events and it has worked out pretty well.

My race last year was cut very short with just 17 of 200 laps completed (I was wrecked under caution!) so here’s hoping I can go the distance this time around. Here’s also hoping the iRacing servers can hold out, as I expect we will surpass last years registration count of 759!

Return to Indy

Monday, July 26th, 2010

Intense battling in the late stages of the Brickyard 400

iRacing.com Brickyard 400 results (iRacing members only!)

The next event in the iRacing World Tour has come around already (second event in the month of July!) and this time it was the virtual recreation of a popular NASCAR event, the Brickyard 400. The race sees the top tier NASCAR Sprint Cup racing at the famous Indianapolis Motor Speedway for 160 laps of high adrenaline action.

The event was scheduled at a pretty unpleasant time (01:30am) but as I have raced in every 2010 event so far, I made the choice to race and I’m very glad I did.

As suggested in a recent post I decided to avoid the early mishaps by starting from the pitlane, despite being gridded 5th in my split (which was the 4th highest split of the 11 splits). I’ve had such terrible results in the previous oval World Tour events that I set my goal at just lapping at the very back and just seeing what happens. A lot of drivers crash out and retire in these events, so I was just hoping to gain the positions from the retirees and leaving it at that.

The plan worked pretty well. In the early stages of the race everyone was extremely co-operative and willing to give room and it seemed most everyone was on the same page in realising it was a long race and there was no value in racing hard from the get-go. When the inevitable wrecks happened I generally had plenty of space and crept through the carnage unscathed. Mostly.

The first half of the race I stayed in positions 25th to 30th biding my time and then I started to slowly gain track position in the second half. As the laps unwound the field became more racy and I picked up some damage on lap 121 when my car was clipped whilst evading a wrecking car. I had worked my way up to 11th (I was positioning my car for the end-game) but the damage was severe enough for me to use up my one and only reset. Once restored, I had a great car again and it fared well compared to the rest of the field who had already used their resets and taken further knocks.

The last 30 laps were very intense – everyone was firmly in ‘race’ mode and no quarter was given. It made the race quite messy with yellows following yellows but in the short green laps in between the racing was fantastic.

I had an exhilarating battle in the dying laps and was able to finish 4th as we crossed the line for the last time.

Started : pitlane (was gridded 5th initially)
Finished : 4th, 113 points (8 incident pts)
iRating : +66
Safety Rating : A/3.30 (+ 0.07)

The next world tour event takes place on August 14 and features the Tour Modified at Thompson Speedway.