IndyCar iRacing Challenge

INDYCAR iRacing Challenge

2020
Tournament information
Sport	IndyCar
Dates	28 March 2020–2 May 2020
Administrator	IndyCar
Host(s)	iRacing
Final positions
Champion	Scott McLaughlin
2021 →

The IndyCar iRacing Challenge (stylized as INDYCAR iRacing Challenge) was a series of esports events held as a temporary replacement of the suspended 2020 IndyCar Series due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The series was run on the platform of iRacing. ^[1] The virtual races were broadcast on various IndyCar social media channels. Additionally, all races, but the first one, were broadcast live on NBCSN. ^{[2] [3]}

The races featured full time and part time drivers currently on the Indycar grid. They also featured guest drivers from other racing series' like Formula One and NASCAR. ^{[4] [5]}

Teams and Drivers

Team	No.	Driver(s)	Round(s)
A. J. Foyt Enterprises	4	Sébastien Bourdais	All
	14	Tony Kanaan	All
	41	Dalton Kellett	All
Andretti Autosport	26	Zach Veach	All
	27	Alexander Rossi	All
	28	Kyle Kirkwood	1-2
		Ryan Hunter-Reay	3-6
	29	James Hinchcliffe	All
	39	Scott Speed	6
Andretti Herta Autosport w/ Marco Andretti & Curb-Agajanian	98		1-2
		Marco Andretti	3-4, 6
		Chaz Mostert	5
Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport	88	Colton Herta	All
Arrow McLaren SP
	04	Lando Norris	5-6
	5	Patricio O'Ward	All
	6	Robert Wickens	4
	7	Oliver Askew	All
Carlin	31	Conor Daly	6
		Felipe Nasr	3-5
	59		1-2
		Max Chilton	3-6
Chip Ganassi Racing	8	Marcus Ericsson	All
	9	Scott Dixon	2-6
	10	Felix Rosenqvist	All
Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh	55	Álex Palou	All
Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan	18	Santino Ferrucci	All
Dale Coyne Racing with Byrd & Belardi	33	James Davison	3, 6
Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	24	Sage Karam	All
Ed Carpenter Racing	20	Ed Carpenter	6
		Conor Daly	1-5
	21	Rinus VeeKay	4-6
		Ed Carpenter	2-3
	50		4-5
IndyCar Provisional	3	Dale Earnhardt Jr.	3
	48	Jimmie Johnson	1-2
	51	Kyle Busch	4
Juncos Racing	11	Kyle Kaiser	1-5
	25	Stefan Wilson	6
Meyer Shank Racing	60	Jack Harvey	2-6
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	15	Graham Rahal	All
	30	Takuma Sato	4-6
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing with Citrone/Buhl Autosport	45	Spencer Pigot	5
Team Penske	1	Josef Newgarden	All
	12	Will Power	All
	22	Simon Pagenaud	All
	2	Scott McLaughlin	1-5
	40		6
	3	Hélio Castroneves	4
	911		6
Top Gun Racing	99	RC Enerson	6

Schedule

Rd.	Date	Race name	Track	Location
1	March 28	American Red Cross Grand Prix	R  Watkins Glen International	Watkins Glen, New York
2	April 4	Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama Presented by AmFirst	R  Barber Motorsports Park	Birmingham, Alabama
3	April 11	Chevrolet 275	O  Michigan International Speedway	Brooklyn, Michigan
4	April 18	Firestone 175	O  Twin Ring Motegi	Motegi, Japan
5	April 25	AutoNation IndyCar Challenge	R  Circuit of the Americas	Austin, Texas
6	May 2	First Responder 175	O  Indianapolis Motor Speedway	Speedway, Indiana
Source: [6]

O Short oval/Superspeedway

R Road/street course

Results

Rd.	Race	Pole position	Fastest lap	Most laps led	Race Winner
					Driver	Team
1	Watkins Glen	Sage Karam	Will Power	Sage Karam	Sage Karam	Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
2	Barber	Sage Karam	Felix Rosenqvist	Sage Karam	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske
3	Michigan	Marcus Ericsson	Dale Earnhardt Jr.	Sage Karam	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske
4	Motegi	Robert Wickens	Sage Karam	Will Power	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske
5	COTA	Lando Norris	Lando Norris	Lando Norris	Lando Norris	Arrow McLaren SP
6	Indianapolis	Scott McLaughlin	Stefan Wilson	Will Power	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske
Source: [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]

Driver Standings

Pos Driver WGI ALA MIS MOT COTA INDY Pts 1 Scott McLaughlin 4 1L 2 24 4 1L 213 2 Will Power 3L 2 4L 3L* 6L 14L* 195 3 Simon Pagenaud 6 5 1L 1L 14 25L 182 4 Felix Rosenqvist 2 6L 21 14 3 9 152 5 Santino Ferrucci 8 10 23 9 5 3 138 6 Sage Karam 1L* 23L* 14L* 7L 33 27L 120 7 Graham Rahal 14 14 5 10 17 13L 113 8 Conor Daly 10 23 13 11 29 2 108 9 Marcus Ericsson 18 25 19L 4L 8 11L 107 10 Patricio O'Ward 13 24 25 26 2L 5 104 11 Álex Palou 20 4 10L 22 9L 26L 100 12 Scott Dixon 16 30 2 11L 10 99 13 Oliver Askew 5 15 31 21L 28 4L 98 14 Josef Newgarden 7 9 24 15L 10 22 98 15 Zach Veach 19 19 11L 8L 26 8 96 16 Jack Harvey 28 6 6L 16 18 88 17 Alexander Rossi 17 22 7L 28 15 12 86 18 Dalton Kellett 11 11 16 19 18 31 80 19 Sébastien Bourdais 23 13 20 20 24 6L 79 20 Colton Herta 22 7 28 18 13 32 73 21 Ryan Hunter-Reay 8L 16 31 7 70 22 Robert Wickens 8 26 5L 32 DNQ 66 23 Lando Norris 1L* 21 64 24 Scott Speed 21 3 15 61 25 Ed Carpenter 18 9 17 22 28 60 26 Felipe Nasr 15 29 17L 31 12 DNQ 57 27 Kyle Kaiser 12 21 12 27 27 DNQ 55 28 Tony Kanaan 24 26 18 30 23 33 40 29 Rinus Veekay 23 7 24 39 30 Dale Earnhardt Jr. 3 35 31 Kyle Kirkwood 9 20 32 32 Jimmie Johnson 16 12 32 33 James Hinchcliffe DNS 17 22 DNS 19 30 28 34 Takuma Sato 12 30 30 28 35 James Davison 15 19 27 36 Max Chilton 27 32 21 23 26 37F Marco Andretti 29 25 17 23 38 Hélio Castroneves 29 16 19 39 Kyle Busch 13 DNQ 17 40 Chaz Mostert 20 10 RC Enerson 20 10 42 Spencer Pigot 25 DNQ 5 42 Stefan Wilson 29 5 Pos Driver WGI ALA MIS MOT COTA INDY Pts

Color Result Gold Winner Silver 2nd-place finish Bronze 3rd-place finish Green Top 5 finish Light Blue Top 10 finish Dark Blue Other flagged position Purple Did not finish Red Did not qualify (DNQ) Brown Withdrew (Wth) Black Disqualified (DSQ) White Did Not Start (DNS) Race abandoned (C) Blank Did not participate In-line notation Bold Pole position (1 point; except Indy) Italics Ran fastest race lap L Led race lap (1 point) * Led most race laps (2 points)

Indianapolis race controversy

The final race of the series, the First Responder 175, saw a driving standards controversy. With nine laps to go in the race, Simon Pagenaud had been leading, only for him to run into the wall. Pagenaud pitted following the crash and while on the pits, told over the radio "We take out Lando [Norris], let's do it", in reference to an earlier incident they had during the race. With two laps to go, Pagenaud, who was slowing down, promptly collided with Norris, who was leading at the time of the incident. Heading into the finish line, Santino Ferrucci took a hard left into then-leader Oliver Askew, who flipped; Scott McLaughlin crossed the finish line, from the pole. ^[13]

Both Pagenaud and Ferrucci received criticism for their poor conduct during the race. Norris alleged that Pagenaud did so in order to prevent a non-IndyCar Series regular from winning the race; ^[14] McLaren CEO Zak Brown tweeted that what Pagenaud did was not something expected from a former Indy 500 champion. Pagenaud insisted that he only intended to impede Norris, while his spotter Ben Bretzman denied instructing Pagenaud to crash into Norris. ^[15] Ferrucci, in denying that his collision was deliberate, claimed that his collision at the end of the last lap was an attempt at a NASCAR-style side drafting, although during the stream he quipped that his clash was "worth it" and he did it "for the fans". ^[16] Although iRacing's sporting code explicitly prohibited deliberate behavior, iRacing did not penalize both drivers, as it was deemed as a private league organized by INDYCAR themselves, rather than iRacing; ^[13] INDYCAR themselves did not issue penalties for both Pagenaud or Ferrucci. Motorsport journalist Marshall Pruett later confirmed that an unnamed party involved in the incidents had also received death threats. ^[17]

References

1. "IndyCar iRacing Challenge announced". Racer. 20 March 2020.
2. "IndyCar lands NBC Sports to broadcast second iRacing Challenge event on Saturday at Barber". Indystar. 1 April 2020.
3. "2020 - INDYCAR IRACING CHALLENGE". Indycar. 2 May 2020.
4. "McLaren's Norris to race in IndyCar iRacing at COTA". Racer. 22 April 2020.
5. "Dale Earnhardt Jr. to Race the No. 3 in IndyCar iRacing Challenge". Racer. 8 April 2020.
6. "2020 - INDYCAR IRACING CHALLENGE". Indycar. 2 May 2020.
7. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - American Red Cross Grand Prix at Watkins Glen International" (PDF). Indycar. 28 March 2020.
8. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama presented by AmFirst" (PDF). Indycar. 4 April 2020.
9. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - Chevrolet 275 at Michigan International Speedway" (PDF). Indycar. 11 April 2020.
10. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - Firestone 175 at Twin Ring Motegi" (PDF). Indycar. 18 April 2020.
11. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - AutoNation INDYCAR Challenge at Circuit of The Americas" (PDF). Indycar. 25 April 2020.
12. "OFFICIAL BOX SCORE - INDYCAR iRacing Challenge - First Responder 175 presented by GMR" (PDF). Indycar. 2 May 2020.
13. Weaver, Matt (2020-05-02). "Last-Lap Chaos Ends with Scott McLaughlin Winning IndyCar iRacing Finale". Autoweek. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
14. "Simon Pagenaud under fire for wiping out Lando Norris at Indy". Eurosport. 2020-05-03. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
15. Weaver, Matt (2020-05-03). "McLaren's Lando Norris, Zak Brown Condemn Simon Pagenaud for Poor iRacing Sportsmanship". Autoweek. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
16. Kalaf, Samer (2022-05-12). "The Anger Over a Virtual IndyCar Crash Exposed the Fragile Facade of Competition". Slate.com. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
17. Pruett, Marshall [@marshallpruett] (May 5, 2020). "I've been told at least one of the drivers involved in Saturday's iRacing drama at IMS have received threats against their lives via social media direct message. Come on, man" (Tweet) – via Twitter.