2026-27 eNASCAR College iRacing Series | Big Apple Battle at Watkins Glen | Week 1 Tournament Preview
October 28th, 2026 by Justin Melillo
The 2026-27 season for the eNASCAR College iRacing Series presented by Logitech G continues on Wednesday night in Upstate New York, at the first road course of the season, in partnership with IMSA, at Watkins Glen International. Titled the Big Apple Battle, 100 collegiate competitors are set to run the gauntlet, with the Quarterfinal and Semifinal rounds of the Tournament showcasing all 100 qualified students and their schools. Only 40 can advance on to Week 2 and the Final round.
From October 20th to October 25th, over 200 eligible collegiate iRacers took to the official Time Attack in hopes of qualifying for the third eNASCAR College iRacing Series Tournament of the season, this one having the Ford Mustang GT4 as their chariot instead of the usual NASCAR Trucks.
Coverage starts on Wednesday night at 7:00 p.m. ET at eNASCAR.com/live and across all of iRacing’s social media channels.
ENTRY LIST
The 100 qualified drivers are listed in the article below:
2026-27 eNASCAR College iRacing Series | Big Apple Battle at Watkins Glen | Time Attack Results
LAST TOURNAMENT
For the second-straight season, the Queen City Crown at Charlotte Motor Speedway gave us a first-time Tournament winner, but this time, it came in a three-wide photo finish, and by the second-closest winning margin in series history at 0.002 seconds. Horry-Georgetown’s Timothy Holmes would not be denied three weeks ago as he took the heat from Triton’s Adam Garza off of the final corner, then managed to hold off Sacramento State’s Dylan Ault at the line.
TRACK INFO
Just south of Seneca Lake, amidst the rolling vineyards and woodlands in Upstate New York’s Finger Lakes region, sits a shrine of American motorsport. Watkins Glen International is more than just a racetrack. It is the birthplace of post-war road racing in North America, a worthy test of some of the best drivers to ever sit in a racecar.
Today, The Glen hosts the NASCAR Cup and O’Reilly Auto Part Series, as well as a six-hour crown jewel of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, Sports Car Club of America professional and amateur racing, ARCA Menards Series, and a major vintage race meet. It has also been home to major concerts and other festivals.
Over the years The Glen has been lengthened once and continually upgraded. Four different configurations of the track are available to iRacing members, and a lap around today’s Grand Prix circuit still incorporates much of the original layout. The first turn is known as “The 90,” a right-hander and a good place to pass. Then it’s up toward “The Esses,” a series of three fast, sweeping apexes leading onto the back straight. The cars reach their top speed here, before hard braking for the bus stop at the end of the straight. Here, the track deviates from its original circuit for “The Boot,” a hammerhead-shaped up-and-downhill section of track added in 1971. Turn 9, where The Boot rejoins the original circuit, is another fairly quick lefthander, tricky because it’s off camber, followed by the even quicker Turn 10, an almost flat-out left-hander. The last corner (Turn 11) is another fast right-hander that leads out onto the front straight.
Racing first came to The Glen in 1948 in the form of the Watkins Glen Grand Prix, an SCCA-sanctioned event that ran on a more than six mile course over the back roads of the town. The success of that event eventually led to the construction of a permanent track, the resulting product a little more than a third in length of the original street course. In 1957, the track hosted its first race, a NASCAR Grand National Series event won by Buck Baker over Fireball Roberts. The following year, Formula Libre showed up, and, not long after that, Watkins Glen hit the big time.
In 1961, Formula 1 came to the little town by the lake, bringing with it some of the most legendary names in motor sports. For the next two decades, the home of the United States Grand Prix was Watkins Glen. The early eighties saw some tough times for The Glen: F1 held its last race there in 1980, and it was closed to all but spectator-free SCCA meets for two years, but the track would recover soon enough under new ownership. In 1986, NASCAR’s top series returned to The Glen, and with it, a whole new renaissance for the track began.
ABOUT THE SERIES
The eNASCAR College iRacing Series presented by Logitech G gives college students from the United States and Canada the opportunity to compete for their share of $60,000 in scholarships. Using the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series vehicles, 100 drivers qualify for each Tournament by registering and posting their fastest lap times in the Time Attack through the iRacing UI. With hundreds of colleges and universities represented in each Time Attack, drivers are competing not only against the greater iRacing community, but also their own classmates, for a spot on the newly-minted bracket.
Week 1 of the Big Apple Battle starts on Wednesday, October 28th, at 7:00 p.m. ET. Week 2 will take place one week later, on Wednesday, November 4th. The next Tournament is the Great Lakes Gauntlet, once again at Michigan International Speedway, and once again returning to the NASCAR Craftsman Trucks for the competition. Time Attacks open on November 3rd and run until November 8th.
For more information on the eNASCAR College iRacing Series, visit pcl.gg/pages/enascar.
For more information about eNASCAR, visit eNASCAR.com.
For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit iRacing.com.
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