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David Phillips
Editor and ChiefDavid Phillips is a long-time contributor to print and electronic publications in the U.S. and abroad, including Racer, Autosport, AutoWeek, Motor Sport and SPEEDtv.com, oversees the daily updating of news stories and assigns, edits and contributes feature material for inRacingNews.com.
Chris Hall
iRacing.com Series WriterChris Hall has been writing since the nineties and moved into motorsports reporting in 2005, covering series such as ALMS, British GT, FIA GT, Le Mans and 2CV racing for Full Throttle magazine, Motorsport.com, The-Paddock.net, GTGateway.com, L' Endurance and, of course, inRacingNews. During 2008 and 2009, he worked with the RSS Performance Porsche Carrera Cup Team (and former British GT(C) champions) as a data engineer for a variety of drivers and models of 997s.
Jameson Spies
Contributing Writer19 years old, Jameson Spies lives in Quartz Hill, California. He grew-up surrounded by racing. His mother raced late models throughout Southern California while his father built and setup the car. Not surprisingly, Jameson began racing go-karts at the age of 13, and is now racing Spec Trucks at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale. He has a passion about all forms of racing and hopes to make a career out of it.
Jason Lofing
iRacing.com Series WriterJason is 21 years old and was born and raised in Elk Grove. California. A big time NASCAR fan, he hasn’t missed a race on Sunday in years. Lofing is also a huge San Fransisco Giants fan and tries to take in at least a couple games a year. Other than sim racing, his biggest (and far more expensive!) hobby is photography. Although he is rather new to sim racing, Lofing has already accomplished some pretty impressive results, qualifying for the 2011 iRacing Oval Pro Series in Season 1, 2011, winning the inaugural Landon Cassill Qualifying Challenge and finishing runner-up in the second one.
Tim Terry
Contributing WriterTim Terry, aka the voice of Maritime stock car racing, fell in love with sim racing in 2004 after he joined the Sim Racing Network crew as a pit reporter. From October 2004 to SRNtv’s closure in June 2007, he’s covered prestigious races and leagues such as the Online 500, FLM Fall 400, Real Racing Online and the DMP Racing League – each as the lead broadcaster for the company. At the same time the wheels started to turn in another direction as he began announcing stock car racing locally. Terry became the assistant announcer at Scotia Speedworld in May 2007 and took over full duties in May 2009 when long-time voice Mike Kaplan retired from the track. Terry also became the series voice of the Parts For Trucks Pro Stock Tour in ’09 and continues to hold down both posts in 2011. He has also announced races for the Pro All Stars Series, Atlantic Open Wheel and Maritime League of Legends tours and has called races at six different Atlantic Canadian tracks. Terry can be heard online at WebRacingNetwork.com, RLMtv.com and OLRtv.com covering sim races. He also makes occasional appearances on PSRtv.com. In addition to inRacingNews, his articles and columns can be read on ScotiaSpeedworld.ca, MaritimeProStockTour.com and his own website at timterryonline.com.
David Allen
Contributing WriterNorth Carolina born and raised with over 15 years of computer/IT experience, I combine two of my biggest hobbies -- racing and technology -- here at inRacingNews. In my spare time I run a Nascar fan site and cure my own need for speed riding atvs. If it involves technology or racing I'll be there, but combine the two and I'll be looking a front row seat. Stop by and say hello anytime!
Allen Krier
Contributing WriterAllen was born in West Palm Beach, Florida but grew up in Atlanta and attended Georgia College and State University where he received a BS in Information Systems. Currently a resident of Albany, GA, he started sim racing in 2008 while in college when iRacing was first released to the public. Since then, Krier has been a two time iRacing Pro Series driver (2009 and 2010), picking up one Pro Series win at Daytona in ‘09. Besides sim racing, Allen’s other hobbies include RC Car racing as well as “attending and watching any sporting event that I can including going to the local dirt track.
Chris Cunningham
Contributing WriterChris is 20 years old, and recently moved to Charlotte, NC during his sophomore year in college to feed his need for speed. More than just an auto racing enthusiast, Cunningham has risen through the ranks of BMX Racing, Sailboat Racing, and Cycling. Cunningham recently took up go karting, and qualified as an alternate for the 2011 Red Bull Kart Fight at the PRI expo. Aside from racing, Cunningham has recently picked up the hobby of competitive eating (Ranked #7 Collegiate Eater in the country!), and competes all over the east coast in various contests. Chris also enjoys sim racing, writing, playing the drums, and enjoying college at UNC Charlotte.
Tim Doyle
Contributing WriterI've been a race fan since before I can remember, going to dirt tracks around the Washington, DC area since the early 70's with my parents. I got away from racing during my school years but in 1989 a friend and I went to a race in Hagerstown, MD and from there my life was all about racing. I currently live in Winchester, VA and while Dirt Late Models is my favorite form of racing, I also enjoy many other forms such as F1, IndyCar, 410 sprint cars on dirt and (probably more than anything) sim racing. My favorite driver is Ayrton Senna.
I was introduced to sim racing in 1989 when a friend turned me onto Indy 500 The Sim by Papyrus. It took me a few years to own my own PC but once I did, all I wanted to do was sim race. I tried to race my friends as much as possible via modem racing back in the 90's before joining TEN in 1998. From there I devoted a lot of time to online racing enjoying every minute of it. I was able to meet a lot of my competitors from all over the world at LAN events and races I went to. Being able to call some real world drivers friends as a result of sim racing is probably the neatest part of this whole deal!
David Roberts
Contributing WriterDavid lives in Brisbane and is a former Australian National Formula Ford Champion who now owns his own marketing and design company. After racing in Europe, David returned down under to swap a career behind the wheel for a career in the creative department. He now has three children, an ongoing love affair with the good ol’ days of motor racing, and just enough spare time left to enjoy a bit of sim-racing with a few of his old mates.
Ben Rothberg
Contributing WriterI was born and raised in the south eastern suburbs of Melbourne where I still am situated. I am currently at University studying for a Certificate in Motorsport and hoping I will be able to achieve my top goal and become a part of a race team. In the sim-racing world, I won an rFactor V8 Supercar season and also was awarded with Best & Fairest award. I am now situated with the best simulation in the world (iRacing.com!) and love every minute of it. I currently race in the V8 Supercar Online Series and finished 16th overall in 2012 Season 1.
Dylan Sharman
Contributing WriterI was born in Adelaide and we moved-out for Angle Vale for a few years until I was about 7 years old, when we moved to the Barossa Valley where I live now. I'm 19 years old and currently traveling back and forth weekly as I’m studying for a Diploma of Furniture Design and Technology.
I’ve always had a love for racing as my close family did some racing and we were always out at the local dirt track. I joined iRacing back in 2010 and slowly but surely got the hang of it as this is my first experience with sim racing and am loving it each time I race. I’ve won two SK Modified titles (almost had three in a row but finished P2 in 2011 S4), an inRacingNews Challenge championship (2012 S1 Mazda) and was also an AustralAsian Intel GT Series Finalist.
Mahar Conquers Homestead
by Michael Conti on November 23rd, 2011
Homestead-Miami Speedway played host to all the action of Week 3 of the NASCAR iRacing.com Class B Series (NICBS). Arguably one of the most fun tracks on the iRacing service, HMS offers some of the best in side-by-side online racing thanks to the variable banking of its corners. “Variable Banking” is a new style of track construction that has surfaced in the past decade where the bottom of the track is less banked than the top, which gives the top side a slight grip advantage over the bottom — an advantage offset by the fact that the top groove is the long way around any turn. Because of this, variably banked tracks see drivers using three to four grooves of the track to try to find the fastest way around.
HMS' variable banking enables competitors to run different grooves.
Track owners wanted more side-by-side racing, or simply more exciting racing for the fans. They have succeeded in this monumental task, at least in part because of the variable banking, as tracks like the Homestead-Miami Speedway are constantly seeing high attendance numbers. iRacing’s virtual HMS is no different as far as attendance numbers go, as 629 iRacers participated in at least one official race in the NiCBS last week. Unlike Phoenix International Raceway in Week 2, HMS saw plenty green flag racing and a minimal number of cautions. This brought the best out in the drivers they frequently had to wheel these 700hp beasts around the track on 50 lap old tires, making for some intense action throughout the week. This week, we’ll be looking at the racing from the 3137 Strength of Field (SoF) race that took place on Wednesday night.
The Racing
19 drivers took to the grid with Michael Patton grabbing the pole over Lance Williams and Jeff Dukehart. The race would only be slowed by two cautions for eight laps of the 100 laps. Green flag racing was the norm in this race. Michael Patton would lead the first lap, his only turn at the front, before being overtaken by the blazingly fast Lance Williams (78 laps led). Williams led up until just past half-distance when the first caution of the race came out. Subsquently, Brad Mahar (11 laps led) held the lead for a few laps before Williams regained his spot at the top.
Williams looked to be a lock for the victory, but the hard charging Joshua Gerrald (six laps led), winner of the ETV broadcasted race on Friday night, took the lead with under twenty laps to go. He would led for some five laps before his King Pin Motorsports (KPM) teammate, Mahar, wrestled the lead away and went on to take the victory. KPM finished 1-2-3 with their drivers Mahar (197), Brian Macklin (186), and Gerrald (175) all cashing-in big points. Behind the KPM trio came Nick Williams (164) and Patrick Davis (153) to round-out the top five. Some honorable mentions also go to Jason Vannatta who led two laps and the always-strong Armando Vargas who led two laps as well.
The Numbers
Although Mahar scored the most points in a single race last week, he would not leave HMS with the most overall points for the week. Brandon Schmidt (187) and Gary Cooksey (180) departed South Florida with more overall points, leaving Mahar third on the week. In the end, after everything was said and done, Schmidt was the overall point’s leader for the 2011 NiCBS Season after Week 3.
Enough about points already; they’re enough to drive anyone crazy! Qualifying at HMS was very important as clean air was key to being successful, as were four fresh iRacing Raptor Tires. Schmitten Chassis Works (SCW) swept the top four spots with Schmidt taking the pole with a 32.05 second lap. Second was David Cater and Matt Whitten both clocking in at 32.09s. Ties were the name of the game as Cooksey took fourth with a run of 32.15s and, rounding out the top five, was Brian Macklin who running an identical 32.15s lap. If you’re wondering where Thomas Smith, the Week 1 and 2 overall pole sitter, ended-up, he clocked-in 11th.
The Time Trial Challenge (TTC) was just as close as qualifying and saw many drivers within hundredths and thousandths of each other. The winner of the TTC at Homestead was Thomas Smith, taking the top spot for the third week in a row, quite an incredible feat! His run of 32.94s put him only two hundredths over Dukehart. Ron Thomas took third, James Heater came home fourth ahead of Cooksey.
Looking Ahead
HMS was a fantastic week across the board: From qualifying to time trials to the races, the NiCBS competitors outdid themselves! Next week, the NiCBS will tackle the fast, but slick Atlanta Motor Speedway. Look for KPM and SCW to continue their dominance and for Thomas Smith to try and make it four in a row in the TTC.
Before I close, I’d like to wish all our US-based readers a Happy Thanksgiving . . . and best wishes to iRacers the world over! We all have many things to be grateful for and one thing that I’m truly grateful for is the iRacing service. It puts people like me who are trying to start a racing career in a spot where it can become possible. I believe in iRacing and look for it to only get stronger as the years go on! Thanks for reading!