Masier Marches On

by Chris Hall on August 31st, 2010

Continuing his relentless charge to the iRacing Pro Series for Road Racing (iPSRR) title, Luca Masier put on another flawless performance to claim maximum points on the virtual Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course. The Italian racer took an incident-free pole-to-flag victory in his solitary online race of the week to head the standings table by over four-hundred points.

The Indianapolis skyline overlooks as iRacing's pros tackle the Brickyard's road course.

“This was another race where I had to keep until the end the highest concentration,” Masier shared post race. “I managed to stay in first position after the pit stop with Klaus Kivekäs very close to me. In the second stint my pace was pretty good and this allowed me to maintain the lead of the race ahead of Klaus; congratulations to him for his good race.”

The second place finish behind Masier gave Kivekäs the third highest total of the week, which made up for losing-out on an assured podium in his second race due to technical problems. “It was undoubtedly the most amazing race I’ve ever had except for the fact that I got disconnected from the server with two laps to go and ended up with I don’t even know or care what position,” said the frustrated Scandinavian after his opening race of the week. “It was extremely important for me to get a score this week because I’m starting at a university next week and undoubtedly it will get much more difficult for me to find time to make these races.”

After taking his second race win on the bounce in the iPSRR, Matthias Egger was shaded from the highest score in the V8 Ford Falcon championship by just 13 points. The Italian sim-racer followed in his countryman’s footsteps to take a pole-to-flag victory in his forty-lap race.

Heitkotter (2) and Rietveld (1) enjoyed a lengthy battle on Saturday.

“From the first laps in Indianapolis I realized that this track, will become my love,” enthused Egger. “I start from the pole and this was another big victory, my first pole position in this unbelievable season. At the start I shut down all the panels and start to drive as hard as I can. Behind me the fight let me create a nice 10 seconds gap over Jeffrey [Rietveld] and Klaus. After the pit-stop I remain with a good seven seconds gap and started to drive hard again. The battle between Klaus and Jeffrey let me to drive calm and relaxed so I bring home this awesome second victory in a row with also the best lap of the race.”

Cashing-in on Kivekäs’ technical woes, Bryan Heitkotter collected 256 points for Round Nine, after grabbing a second place finish in the final laps of the race. “Lots of good battles in that race. The fight for the podium behind Matthias was raging all race long,” the Californian club member told inRacingNews. “I only earned third but Klaus’ disconnect gifted me one spot at the end. I have to say sorry to Vincent Staal for slamming the door in Turn Two. At the time I thought I was clear, now I can see I wasn’t. Good fight though, a bit rough to start out with but we cleaned up pretty quick.”

Claiming his first podium in the iPSRR, Blake Townend made a late charge to catch and pass Jeffrey Rietveld on the final lap of his race. “Jeffrey had pitted early so I had the advantaged with a set of fresh tyres but he had a massive gap over me so I had to be as consistent as possible and make sure I don’t over drive the car,” the Englishman explained. “I had something like 14 laps to go and the gap was 10.9 seconds. I thought to myself ‘If I can catch him it will be on the last lap and I would have to give it my all to get past.’

“Eventually the gap came down and on the last lap I was up on his bumper.  While he was being really aggressive and fighting the car, he out- braked himself into the hairpin and got the car a bit sideways which allowed me to get through on the inside of the corner. I just had to stay ahead with a few corners left and done just that.”

Staal gets well out of shape as Heikotter slams the door.

Round Ten of the iPSRR heads to Brands Hatch Indy circuit with Masier holding a 406 point advantage over Kivekäs, who has registered eight rounds of results and 2057 marks.   Egger and Jesse Nieminen occupy third and fourth in the standings table from their seven weeks of results, holding 1821 and 1787 points respectively; putting them just ahead of Hugo Luis and Rietveld.

Screen shots: Bryan Heitkotter