FS1 provides virtual NASCAR thrills
For sports fans who have gone nearly two weeks without live events, Fox Sports 1 offered an attractive alternative to Sunday’s postponed NASCAR Cup Series race at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Instead of actual cars trading paint in close quarters around the 1.5-mile oval, the drivers – including Dale Earnhardt Jr., Denny Hamlin, Kurt and Kyle Busch, Jimmie Johnson, Clint Bowyer, Alex Bowman and Joey Logano – practiced proper social distancing as they competed from their own home video consoles in a virtual 100-lap race.
“We know, this is not real racing,” play-by-play announcer Mike Joy told the FS1 audience. “But it’s not a video game either – iRacing is a very sophisticated simulation that real race drivers as well as armchair racers use and compete against each other.”
Coverage of the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series was structured just like the network’s regular NASCAR broadcast – from a pre-race prayer (from Motor Racing Outreach president Billy Mauldin) and national anthem (Curb Records artist Dylan Scott) to the engine-roaring “Crank It Up” feature.
Once the green flag dropped, however, an all-out video game mentality prevailed as the veteran gamers and professional drivers started jockeying for track position. Crashes and caution flags were hard to avoid, especially with the iRacing rule that each car can have its damage reset twice during the race to like-new condition. As a result, there were few long runs in between the multiple caution periods.
Fans enthusiastically followed along on Twitter, and some of the drivers themselves got involved with the discussion on social media.
The drivers completed their laps around the virtual track lined with actual sponsor billboards and the packed grandstands gave a collective roar when perennial fan favorite Earnhardt took the lead near the race’s midpoint.
All the while, the broadcast shifted from camera shots of the leaders to an overhead view to a first-person look from the driver’s seat.
“Where I’m blown away right now (is) when I look at the steering from Chase Elliott and I hear the throttle. It is so realistic,” FS1 analyst and four-time Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon marveled. “When I run a race at Homestead that’s exactly what it felt like.”
It didn’t hurt that NASCAR fans ended up getting exactly the kind of finish they would have wanted.
After a late caution, Earnhardt and Hamlin held the top two spots and battled back and forth for the lead over the final three laps – with the two colliding just before the start/finish line and Hamlin prevailing.
“It’s always fun when you win, but regardless, I mean, it’s just – it was a great event,” Hamlin told the media on a postrace conference call.
Sunday’s inaugural event felt like a real race. Except Hamlin was driving his No. 11 Toyota barefoot, and Earnhardt, who retired from Cup racing after the 2017 season, had only one hand on the steering wheel.
“I like feeling the pedals,” Hamlin said on a conference call. “With shoes, I can’t do it, so I always go barefoot.”
And Dale Jr. said he thinks driving with two hands is slower in sim racing.
Seven NASCAR races have been postponed at this point because of the COVID-19 outbreak.
With at-home setups ranging from the most basic with a computer on a desk to super intense rigs with moving seats and roll cages, 35 NASCAR drivers competed in the 100-lap race. As FS1’s broadcast pointed out, this was Hamlin’s 31st iRacing win in his 164th start.
“He’s really, really good,” Earnhardt told FS1 immediately after the race. “I’ve raced him on here for two decades. I thought he would be hard to beat.”
And as far as that last-lap contact goes, Hamlin – who estimated his intense simulator was in the $40,000 price range – said he “definitely” would have raced Earnhardt that hard in real life. Junior, on the other hand, said he probably gave the No. 11 Toyota driver more leeway than normal.
“I was trying to get a good finish, I was trying to win the race, and I was trying not to wreck anybody,” Earnhardt told FS1. “So I think I probably gave him a little more room than I really wanted to, but I had to to keep from crashing him or anybody else.”
Hamlin pledged to donate $5,000 to families in the Homestead-Miami area affected by the coronavirus outbreak if he won. Fox Sports and NASCAR driver Kevin Harvick said afterward they would match that amount.
“For the community, the racing community, the NASCAR drivers to come together and put 20-something drivers on the racetrack with such short notice,” Hamlin said, “and for it all to come together and have a great finish, I think it was definitely a success.”