Sandeep Banerjee came from deep in the field and stayed out of the trouble that plagued several of the drivers at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to take the checkered flag in the second race of the NASCAR iRacing.com Series World Championship. Banerjee, a 26-year-old resident of Mumbai, India, underscored the international nature of the series.
Starting 26th, Banerjee sustained damage to his car in the one incident he wasn’t able to avoid during the course of the event that saw several top contenders eliminated from contention. A late-race charge with tire smoke billowing from his damaged car took Banerjee past race leader Josh Berry (Hendersonville, Tenn.) and into Victory Lane.
“This is a dream come true,” Banerjee said in a post-race interview that included thanks to his family and his fellow virtual racers. “After going winless in the NASCAR iRacing Pro Series last year, despite coming close a few times, this is a Godsend. I'd also like to thank iRacing and NASCAR for everything they've done to make this series possible.”
Berry, a real-world Legends Car racer lost second place to Richard Towler (Yorkshire, UK) when he ran out of fuel on the final lap, finishing 16th. Brad Davies (Wauchula, Fla.) the second-place finisher in the 2009 NASCAR iRacing.com Pro Series, finished third. And with Daytona winner Dale Earnhardt, Jr. unable to race at Las Vegas, Thomas Lewandowski’s (Buffalo, N.Y.) fourth-place finish vaulted him into the overall point lead. Jim Caudill, Jr. (Whitesburg, Ky.) rounded out the top five.
The race on the 1.5-mile oval saw a total of seven cautions for 27 laps, taking a toll on a number of cars. In addition to Berry, other championship hopefuls, including Ray Alfalla (Miami, Fla.), Derek Wood (Lincoln, Neb.), and 2009 NASCAR iRacing.com Pro Series titlist Josh Parker (Cranston, R.I.) all had races they'd like to forget.
The biggest incident of the race happened on a restart coming to lap 87. Germany’s Martin Thiemt missed a shift and log-jammed the field. Jesse Atchison (Prince Frederick, Md.) had to check up behind him and a few rows back Connor Mackenzie (Nova Scotia, Canada) checked up more than Davies expected which stacked up the field.
"I shifted from 1st to 3rd,” Thiemt explained following the ensuing melee. “Sorry to all that got involved in this big wreck."
After two races of the NASCAR iRacing World Championship, Lewandowski leads in points with Jayson Anderson (Visalia, Calif.), who finished 10th at Las Vegas, in second, and Thiemt, who escaped more or less unscathed from the multi-car accident to finish 12th, in third. The third race of the season will commence in two weeks in the tight confines of the high-banked half-mile Bristol Motor Speedway on March 9.
