Monday night was like deja vu, all over again, for the 35 drivers of the iRacing World of Outlaws NOS Energy Sprint Car World Championship.
Last year, Alex Bergeron dominated the season opener from Volusia Speedway Park, scoring the first of his five victories on the way to the 2019 series championship. This year’s opener from Volusia was no different, as the Team ABR driver once again won the pole, his heat race, and the main event—leading all 35 laps on the way to a victory of more than eight seconds over Swindell SpeedLab’s Blake Cannon. It was a dramatic reversal of fortunes for the defending champion from the previous week’s exhibition race at Volusia, where he struggled in qualifying and could only muster a fifth place finish.
“I was right beside the fence, but I barely touched it and just never made a mistake,” explained Bergeron. “I wasn’t sandbagging (last week)—in that race I was fast, I just didn’t run a good line in qualifying. But tonight, we just had a perfect night like we did last year.”
Cameron Merriman, who qualified second and joined Bergeron and Cannon as a heat winner, was third, while series veterans Adam Elby and David Heileman completed the top five. Sixth place finisher Alex Smolders of Kinser Racing Sim Team was the biggest mover in the 35-lap main event, jumping from 17th on the grid after winning the first last chance qualifier. Despite a handful of incidents in the heat races that knocked some competitive cars out of contention, the main event was relatively clean, with only three drivers failing to complete every lap.
Volusia Speedway Park Results
Main event results from Monday’s iRacing World of Outlaws NOS Energy Sprint Car World Championship event at Volusia Speedway Park were as follows:
Fin. | St. | No. | Driver | Laps | Led | Interval | Best | Pts. |
| 1 | 1 | 12 | Alex A Bergeron | 35 | 35 | 0.000 | 15.312 | 78 |
| 2 | 3 | 44 | Blake Cannon | 35 | 0 | -8.586 | 15.708 | 75 |
| 3 | 2 | 17 | Cameron Merriman | 35 | 0 | -8.823 | 15.792 | 72 |
| 4 | 7 | 74 | Adam Elby | 35 | 0 | -9.105 | 15.761 | 68 |
| 5 | 13 | 49 | David Heileman | 35 | 0 | -10.263 | 15.743 | 63 |
| 6 | 17 | 211 | Alex Smolders | 35 | 0 | -10.880 | 15.765 | 58 |
| 7 | 4 | 18 | Austen Semmelmann | 35 | 0 | -11.087 | 15.875 | 60 |
| 8 | 5 | 15 | Zack Novak | 35 | 0 | -11.714 | 15.736 | 56 |
| 9 | 9 | 71 | Cole V Cabre | 35 | 0 | -12.400 | 15.816 | 52 |
| 10 | 15 | 91 | Anthony Jobe | 35 | 0 | -13.002 | 15.836 | 48 |
| 11 | 11 | 51 | Matthew McKinney | 35 | 0 | -13.104 | 15.837 | 47 |
| 12 | 18 | 25 | Tyler Ducharme | 35 | 0 | -13.397 | 15.803 | 43 |
| 13 | 20 | 99 | Logan Clampitt | 35 | 0 | -14.008 | 15.791 | 40 |
| 14 | 8 | 00 | Kendal Tucker | 35 | 0 | -14.042 | 15.818 | 42 |
| 15 | 6 | 81 | Dillon Semmelmann | 35 | 0 | -14.383 | 15.905 | 40 |
| 16 | 14 | 5 | Braden Eyler | 35 | 0 | -15.452 | 15.902 | 36 |
| 17 | 19 | 41 | Colton W Hardy | 35 | 0 | -18.045 | 15.881 | 33 |
| 18 | 16 | 39 | Chase Cabre | 34 | 0 | -1 L | 15.752 | 32 |
| 19 | 10 | 52 | James Edens | 34 | 0 | -1 L | 15.880 | 31 |
| 20 | 12 | 4 | James Tiernan | 21 | 0 | -14 L | 15.860 | 29 |
The 2020 iRacing World of Outlaws NOS Energy Sprint Car World Championship season resumes next week with the series debut of Don Martin’s Lernerville Speedway. Dirt oval fans who can’t wait for that, however, can tune in to DIRTVision this Wednesday to watch real World of Outlaws pros take on Knoxville Raceway in the inaugural World of Outlaws iRacing Invitational at 9PM ET/6PM PT.
For more information on the World of Outlaws, visit www.worldofoutlaws.com. For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit www.iracing.com.
Image via Team ABR
