2025 eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series | Team Championship, Rookie of the Year, Relegation outlook entering season finale

While the majority of eyes will be on the fight for the 2025 eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series Championship, there are multiple prerogatives in play for Tuesday night’s season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

For Steven Wilson (Spire Motorsports), Zack Novak (Channel 199 Sim Racing), Vicente Salas (Kanaan Esports), and Casey Kirwan (Kansas City Pioneers), the task is simple—beat the others in that Championship 4 group to win the Dale Earnhardt Jr Cup and a $100,000 payday. Everyone else has at least one other thing to think about as the 16th season concludes with 100 laps of racing around the 1.5-mile oval in South Florida.

Over the opening 17 races to the 2025 season, the stage has been set for the top teams, the top rookies, and the top drivers to shine. Not only will there be the Driver’s Champion, but the Team Champion crowned, Rookie of the Year decided, and the top-20 drivers in the final standings will retain their license for the upcoming Free Agency period in 2026.

TEAM TITLE DOWN TO TWO TEAMS

A select group of drivers are focusing on the Team Championship war that has waged this entire season. Two Championship 4 drivers, Wilson and Novak, are a part of that battle, but the final determination will be dependent on where their teammates finish. Wilson, with Spire Motorsports, has Femi Olatunbosun in his corner, while Novak and Channel 199 Sim Racing have Dylan Duval.

Entering the finale, Spire Motorsports holds a 16-point lead over Channel 199 Sim Racing. Besides the winner getting five more points than the next driver, each spot down to 36th are separated by a single point, with 36th through 40th all earning a single point. A win by either team, whether it’s the drivers racing for the title or not, could be a huge factor.

Both Wilson and Duval, now on separate teams, have won a Team Championship together when they raced for Stewart-Haas eSports in 2022, nearly winning back-to-back seasons in 2023. In 2024, the pair separated, with Duval moving to his current home, previously known as the Nitro Circus Sim Racing Team, paired with Matthew Zwack. Wilson was paired with Ryan Luza at a former team in the series, M80, but neither team was able to out run the Williams Esports duo of Donovan Strauss and the eventual Champion, Parker White.

Spire Motorsports entered the series with Malik Ray and Casey Kirwan as their drivers in 2024, finishing fifth in the final Team Standings. Kirwan moved over to the Kansas City Pioneers while Ray signed with the newcomers at the Vegas Inferno. In 2025, Spire swapped out Ray for Olatunbosun and Kirwan for Wilson, at the time seeming like a lateral move, but proving to be a potential championship-winning move with Wilson breaking the single season wins record with his seventh win of the season at Michigan International Speedway.

Novak ran with a former team as well in the 2024 season, Oxygen Esports. Needing a home in 2025, Channel 199 parted ways with Zwack to make room for the former champion. Novak was hot out of the gate, despite not winning a race until late in the season. Segment 1, a block of five races to start the year, was its own miniature points championship, and Novak wound up scoring the most points. After his first win in nearly six seasons, Novak will fight for his second title on Tuesday night with a chance to double up with the team title.

YEROSCHAK VS. HILL FOR TOP ROOKIE HONORS

There have been some impressive rookie moments throughout the 2025 season. While there hasn’t been a rookie winner yet in the 2025 season, two drivers in particular have come the closest, and they happen to be the two left that could win top rookie honors.

Connor Yeroschak (Letarte Esports) doesn’t have to worry about the Relegation line, but he does still need to put together a solid night to keep Christopher Hill (Apex Racing Team) behind him in the Rookie of the Year battle. Yeroschak sits 11th in the standings, the best of all drivers that didn’t qualify for the playoffs, with 343 points. Down in 17th, 24 points back is Hill. As it stands, they are the only two rookies above the Relegation line, although Blaze Crawford (Team Dillon Esports) and Quentin Warman (Hyak Motorsports) are two of the four drivers below the cut that could fight back above 20th.

Three weeks ago, Yeroschak recorded his best career finish, a second place effort, losing only to Salas at the end of 121 laps at Phoenix Raceway. While Yeroschak already held the lead over Hill by three points entering Phoenix, he was able to extend it by 21 as Hill only managed to finish 23rd. Hill, however, was nearly a lock for the Rookie of the Year after almost winning at both Indianapolis, finishing fourth, and Pocono, finishing second. Hill also almost won at Talladega, but wound up 17th after crashing coming to the line battling for the win.

Hill spent the first 13 races on the wrong side of the relegation line, but was in a particularly unique spot entering the Pocono Regular Season finale. Being within five points of 20th, Hill was in a win-and-in position. Since then, Hill has continued to climb, getting as high as 15th before falling back to 17th at Phoenix. Yeroschak, on the other hand, spent most of the Regular Season above the cut, only barely on the other side for two weeks. Yeroschak led on the final lap at Daytona to open the season, eventually finishing 11th. Later, in the third segment on the season, Yeroschak finished inside the top-1o four times, only faltering at the Chicago Street Course.

The juxtaposition of these two rookies shows a tale of two different seasons, with each showing flashes of brilliance at different moments throughout. Hill’s successes have been more flashy, running more towards the lead and having more chances at victory, but also more challenges through the rest of the year. Yeroschak, on the other hand, has been solid, with a third of the season resulting in top-10 finishes, ultimately giving him the upper hand in the Rookie title fight, only needing a top-20 finish at Homestead-Miami to clinch the honors under any circumstance.

AVOIDING RELEGATION

As per the rules of the series, only the top-20 drivers in the final standings will retain their license for the 2026 season. As it was in the 2025 season, these 20 drivers will be placed into a pool of drivers for the Free Agency period, where they will look to sign on with a team for the upcoming season. The pool will also include two eNASCAR College iRacing Series competitors from the results of the 2024-25 season, and the top-30 finishers in the 2026 eNASCAR Qualifying iRacing Series points.

Going through the eNASCAR Qualifying Series will essentially be akin to starting from the bottom, minus the iRating grind. 16 drivers in the series, plus the eight fill-in drivers that we’ve seen over the course of the season, are already locked out of finishing in the top-20 in the points entering Homestead-Miami, and will need to go through next year’s eNASCAR Qualifying iRacing Series if they want to try and requalify for the Free Agency period in 2026.

All 10 playoff drivers are locked into the top-20, although the six drivers outside the championship battle will still be fighting amongst one another for the best possible placement they can get. As mentioned above, Yeroschak is locked into the top-20 as well, as is Donovan Strauss, who sits 12th in the standings. Ryan Luza (fgrAccel) and Femi Olatunbosun are also locked, sitting 39 and 38 points ahead of 21st in the standings. While 21st could pass them with a win, there is a driver that is suspended for the finale currently inside the top-20 that would not be able to pass them.

Michael Guest (Vegas Inferno), Dylan Ault (Hyak Motorsports), and Christopher Hill are pretty safe, unless they have a bad day. One of three suspended drivers in the finale, Michael Cosey Jr (ERA eSports) hit the incident limit at Phoenix, and cannot run at Homestead-Miami as a result. The other two suspended drivers are Kollin Keister (Jim Beaver Esports) and Tyler Garey (eRacr). Keister will still finish 10th in the standings after making the eNASCAR Playoffs, while Garey is 28th in the points and couldn’t finish inside the top-20 anyway.

Cosey could still stay inside the top-20 if Blaze Crawford scores less than 11 points, Garrett Lowe (BS+COMPETITION) scores less than 17 points, Quentin Warman scores less than 24 points, and Graham Bowlin (Kansas City Pioneers) scores less than 34 points. If one of these does happen, it could be substituted with Malik Ray (Vegas Inferno) scoring less than seven points, or for some unforeseen reason, Seth DeMerchant (fgrAccel) scoring zero points.

Cosey, DeMerchant, and Ray are the last three in entering the finale. Crawford sits 21st, four points behind Ray. Lowe is 22nd, and is 10 points out. Warman is 17 points below the cut in 23rd. Bowlin is the last driver that could point their way back in mathematically, in 24th, 27 points below the cut.

That does leave some big names locked out of the top-20 already, including former series champion Nick Ottinger (William Byron eSports) in 25th, and many former series winners, including Matt Bussa and Jimmy Mullis at Kevin Harvick Inc., Daniel Faulkingham (Six Karma), Cody Byus (Apex Racing Team), Taylor Hurst (Team Dillon Esports), Logan Clampitt (eRacr), and Briar LaPradd (JR Motorsports). These former winners, and all of the Relegated by the end of the finale event, will have to take on the Qualifying Series to have a chance to return to the series in 2026.

The 2025 eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series schedule concludes with the 18th and final round, slated for Tuesday, October 7th, at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Tune in at 7:30 p.m. ET for the Countdown to Green. Race coverage begins at 8 p.m. ET at eNASCAR.com/live and across iRacing social media channels.

For more information on the eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series, visit eNASCAR.com or iRacing.com/eNASCAR.
For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit iRacing.com.­­

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