07 Jan 2010 - Trophy : 20 cars took the start of the opening round for the Winter 2010 Trophy Series, Thomas Cazorla bought the field to the green flag, the Frenchman taking his second career pole in only his fourth V8Thunder start.
An early yellow on Lap 10 was followed by a 59 green flag run, this including 2 green flag stops which spread out the field and caused quiet a stir with Mathieu Souphy and Chris Hill both spinning on entry and Ian Smiff, Andrew Jones and Jim Turner all having to serve drive through penalties for speeding on pit lane.
Lap 69 bought out the second caution, approaching the pits were the lap down cars of Ian Smiff and Stephen Jones, along with race leader Jack Keithley. Keithley missed his braking point and to avoid ramming Smiff spun his car into the inside wall, at the same time Jones also lost it spinning back onto the racing surface where he was collected by the #04 of John McGraw. Smiff became the main benefactor, as the caution was thrown just before he hit pit lane the Englishman aborted his stop and drove through the infield grass to get himself back onto the lead lap.
The race was restarted on lap 73 with Chris Hill leading from Paulo Rocha second, Sergey Rebrov third, Thomas Cazorla fourth, George Sokolowski fifth and Smiff in sixth with 23 laps left it was going to be hard for anybody to make it on fuel and it virtually guaranteed that another set of stop would be required.
Smiff was first to blink and "rolled the dice" by hitting pit lane on lap 80 he came out a few seconds ahead of the pack on the tail end of the lead lap, but on lap 84 the gamble paid off when the caution came out for the third time when Cazorla and Stephen Jones got together in turn 1. With all the other lead lap cars needing to pit, Smiff stayed out and inherited the lead to which he'd not be dethroned from in the 9 lap sprint to the flag, taking his seventh career and first Superspeedway win at V8Thunder. "CJ" Hill followed his fellow Southern Counties resident home in second, with pole man Thomas Cazorla third, Paulo Rocha fourth, Sergey Rebrov fifth and "Gentleman" George Sokolowski rounding out the top 6. V8Thunder goes from the high banked, high speed Daytona to the "Lady in Black" next week at Darlington, there was no "big one" at Daytona despite a large 20 car field - will the Lady in Black be in a bad or good mood for out intrepid racers....? only time will tell. |
06 Jan 2010 - Trucks : After 4 races in the inaugural iRacing Truck series, a picture is emerging for the championship contenders to watch out for. Leading the charge is Denis Razumov with 2 wins from the 4 races to date. Taking the other two wins is his Btards fap posse team-mate Eugene Mozgunov, the Russian pairing have dominated the first quarter of the season and it remains to be seen if the best of the rest can mount a charge on the high speed, high banked Talladega Superspeedway next Wednesday.
Ian Smiff along with Team Ecosse pairing James Ewens and Steve Smith close out the top 5. |
02 Dec 2009 - Trucks : V8 rookie Denis Razumov notched up a dominating win at the Lowes Motor Speedway Wednesday evening, leading home fellow countryman Eugene Mozgunov to score Russia's first ever one-two in the V8Thunder event, Ian Smiff stole 3rd from Team Ecosse's Thomas Hendrickson at the last turn as the American was delayed trying to overcome the Russian motor train up front. With the first half of the race running caution free, and a surprisingly low total of only 4 cautions over the 90 laps, all of the 16 drivers did an exceptional job to keep the racing clean as well as entertaining. Next event on the iRacing Truck Series is at Phoenix next week. |
19 Nov 2009 - Trophy : Chris Hill made up for a dismal season in Inters by taking victory in the V8 Thunder World Championship showdown at Martinsville today.
Hill dominated the event with a victory in Heat 1 followed up by a second behind series rookie Paul Taylor in Heat 2. In the final it was all about a battle between Hill and SRD team-mate Mathieu Souphy with Hill thwarting a last lap challenge from the Belgium to win by 6 tenths of a second. Heat 2 winner Taylor was relieved of third in the final early on by Ian Smiff, who eventually finished third after 2 spins, with Jay Owen 4th, series rookie John McGraw 5th and Lites Series runner up Mike Cooper rounding out the top 6. The next Trophy event is the non-championship race at Daytona International Speedway next Thursday. |
18 Nov 2009 - Trucks :  Rookie Arron Maspero took a first blood victory in Trucks pre-season thunder at the Michigan International Speedway, Maspero held off a final turn challenge from V8 regular Martin Buchan to lead home from fellow rookie Gareth Hickling, Ian Smiff finished third, backwards, with Thomas Hendrickson rounding out the top 4 who were covered by 7 tenths of a second. The next pre-season thunder event takes place next Wednesday at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. |
| 12 Nov 2009 - Team News : |
04 Nov 2009 - V8Thunder : Entries are now open for the Winter 2010 iRacing Trucks and Nascar Racing 2003 Trophy series. The Truck series will start on 2nd December (2009) at the Lowes Motor Speedway with the Trophy series starting on the 7th January 2010 at the Daytona International Speedway. Both series will run Pre-Season "Thunder" events during their regular time slots between now and then to allow drivers to familiarise themselves with the new equipment and each other. There's no relaxing for the drivers though in the off season, with the V8Thunder World Championship "showdown" running on 19th November, the unique, standing start random grid draw event is always a popular alternative to regular testing for the V8Thunder drivers. A few entry slots remain available for all the series at the time of press - the entry form can be found here. |
03 Nov 2009 - Inters : Inters Series Round-up – Jack Keithley completed a sweep of the major titles in Summer '09 at V8 Thunder; his Championship performance was all the more impressive as it came from only 14 starts. From these, he led all drivers in wins (5); Top 5's (12); Poles (9). There was a 194 point gap back to 2nd place Carl Sundberg; Cal led the series with starts (17); Top 10's (17) and completed laps (1661). His run for the title, though boosted by a meagre 50 penalty points, was hampered by 5 DNF's, but this did not prevent him from winning the Independent Championship. 3rd place, nearly 300 points behind Sundberg, was Andrew Jones. "AJ" only started 12 races but logged 5 top 5's and 14 top 10's on his way to the Rookie Title, his 3rd in consecutive seasons, completing a triple-crown of Lites-Trucks-Inters. Honourable mention to Chris Hill, who won 3 races and 4 poles, leading the most laps (391) but 7 DNF's and a series high 381 penalty points cost him dearly in the standings. Team Ecosse A avenged the Truck series defeat by taking the Inters Team Title by 266 over rivals SRD International. England completed a sweep of Nation's Cups', 4 of the top 10 drivers representing the “green and pleasant (but mostly raining) land”. |
02 Nov 2009 - Trucks : Trucks Season Round-up – Jack Keithley had an outstanding season at V8Thunder; his Truck series performance must rank amongst the all-time greats. He led the series in wins (11); Top 5's (14); Poles (11) and laps led (703). However, the most telling stats are points related; his 449 point margin to 2nd place is over 2 whole races ahead, while he only earned 35 penalty points over his 18 races. He has truly set the bar high for future Truck series champions to live up to, although the move to iRacing may shake up the competition from next season. Steve Smith raced to a runners-up spot in the standings; consistency was once again the key for “Smithers” as despite no wins from 17 starts, he had a series high 17 top 10's and only failed to finish one race. Ian Smiff finished 3rd in the standings, 170 points behind his “name-similar” with a win and a pole to show from his 15 starts, he easily won the Independent's Cup for the 5th season running. Honourable mention to George Sokolowski, who completed more laps than any other driver (1669, 94% of all laps). SRD International won the Team title by 115 points from Team Ecosse A, thanks mainly to Keithley with backup from Chris Hill and Mathieu Souphy. Alex Pab added the Trucks Rookie title to his Lites one to score a double in his first season at V8, an impressive start by the Russian who only picked up 15 penalty points from his 12 starts. England provided the top 3 finishers in the Trucks championship and once again took the Nations Cup. |
01 Nov 2009 - Lites : Lites Season round-up – David Bischoff was the dominant force in Lites this season; the Colchester driver led the series in wins (11); poles (10); laps led (321); although he also led in DNF's (7) which he will want to work on for the future. “Bisch” won the Lites Championship by 124 points ahead of runner up Mike Cooper. Cooper had a stellar season, his trademark consistency gave him a shot at the title and his numbers are a testament to this; he led the series in Top 5's (27); Top 10's (36); total laps (1450). He started and finished all 36 races, the only driver to do so. No slouch, he recorded a career high 4 wins this season whilst only scoring 10 penalty points he was by far the cleanest driver to run a full schedule. Andrew Jones had a career best season, winning twice from 26 starts while improving his finishing with only 1 DNF and just 40 penalties meant that despite his limited schedule, he managed to finish 3rd in the standings. Whirlwind Twisters were pushed all the way to the wire by SRD AJI, the closest team battle in years in Lites as Whirlwind retained the title by only 31 points. Erwin Greven was the class of the Independent drivers, easily winning the title in addition to a race win. Alex Pab scored 12 top 5's and a Pole in his debut season and took the Rookie Title by 66 points. England managed to retain the Nations Cup, mostly thanks to the top 3 drivers in the standings being English. |
29 Oct 2009 - Inters : #14 Chris Hill beat #47 Ben Parker to the pole for the second night running, as the V8 Thunder Championship Week drew to a close with the final round of the Summer 2009 Inters Championship. 12 drivers took the green flag for the Ford 300k, 121 laps of the South Florida oval lay ahead. In the absence of Champion-elect Jack Keithley, there was a long hard fight for the race win. Cautions were the story early in the race, 16 laps lost to 5 cautions but once up to speed the field went on an extended green run that has been indicative of the clean driving of the Inters field late this season. The field cycled through green flag pit-stops and as the strategy played out, the story unfolded. Following the stops Parker was eventually able to run down #06 Ian Smiff and pass him for the lead, eventually winning the race by a margin of 2.31 seconds. It was Parker's first win of the season, Smiff finishing 2nd for the second night running while Rookie of the Year, #77 Andrew Jones rounded out the top three, #09 Steve Smith came home 4th and Series runner-up #23 Carl Sundberg was 5th. |
28 Oct 2009 - Trucks : The finals week continued with the ever popular Summer 2009 Trucks Series finale at Homestead. #14 Chris Hill bagged the pole, posting exactly the same time as #47 Ben Parker with #44 Jack Keithley rolling off 3rd. 16 drivers started the 94 lap, 141 mile race and the action slowed on 6 occasions for 22 laps. 8 drivers led laps, swapping the lead 14 times throughout the race. #11 Mike Sadownik led 24 laps for the bonus. When all was said and done, a familiar story began telling itself once again. As the checkers waved, Jack Keithley was the first truck across the stripe, winning for the 16th time this season, his 49th career win. #06 Ian Smiff was 2nd, with #38 Erik Gelotte in 3rd, Sadownik was 4th with CJ finishing 5th. |
27 Oct 2009 - Lites : The V8 Thunder finals week got under way with the final round of the Summer 2009 Lites Series. Mike Sadownik put the #11 on pole, beating out championship leader David Bischoff by 2 thousandths of a second. 12 cars took the green flag for the penultimate race of the series, heading off for 14 laps of the 1.5 mile speedway. Early incidents strung the field out and Sadownik was able to capitalise on being at the front, leading all 14 laps to score his 4th win from 6 outings in Lites this season. #67 Jonathan Stiener finished 1.57 seconds behind in 2nd, ahead of #24 Mike Cooper. Bischoff was involved in contact early and could only manage a 9th place finish.
The final round of the Lites championship was the Feature Race. Jonathan Stiener had the #67 at the top of the time-sheets in Qualifying, just .005 seconds faster than Bischoff. These drivers led 11 drivers to the green flag for 54 laps. 20 of the laps were slowed for caution, as the yellow flag flew 5 times. 3 drivers shared the lead, with Stiener leading 34 laps for the 5 bonus points. A late yellow led to a 4 lap dash for the cash at the end. In spite of intense pressure, Stiener held on to win at the line by .01 seconds, just beating #77 Andrew Jones into 2nd place. 3rd place for Mike Cooper, just .67 seconds behind. Despite retiring 19 laps from home, Bischoff had done enough with a 9th place finish. |
| 26 Oct 2009 - V8Thunder : Homestead-Miami Speedway Championship Finals - Despite the driver's championships being all but over, there is still plenty to race
for in the final rounds of all three series at Homestead...
Lites has been dominated by David Bischoff all season long; 10 poles and 11 wins are
series highs and he leads Mike Cooper by 183 points. Mike is the only driver to
have started (and finished!) every race, his 34 starts have brought him 4 wins and
34 top 10's! The real battle in Lites is for the team title, as Whirlwind Twisters
lead SRD AJI by just 11 points. Erwin Greven will be crowned independent champion,
Alex Pab is the Rookie of the Season and England win the Nations Cup.
Trucks has been a story of Jack Keithley domination this season, 10 wins from 17
races see him lead Steve Smith by 398 points, despite the latter's 16 top 10's from
16 starts. SRD International lead Team Ecosse by 162 points, Ian Smiff leads
Sergey Rebrov by 167 points for the Independent championship while Alex Pab will do
a Rookie double adding Trucks to his lites title. England win the Nations Cup.
Inters has been a familiar story of Jack Keithley domination. His 14 starts have
produced 5 wins, 12 top 5's and he leads Carl Sundberg by 231 points at the final
round. Team Ecosse look set to take the Team title, leading SRD International by
237 points while Carl Sundberg is 185 points ahead of Bjarne Laursen in the Indie
standings. Andrew Jones leads the Rookie Standings by just 6 points from Erwin
Greven in the closest individual scrap across the 3 series, while England sweep the
Nations cups. |
| 22 Oct 2009 - Inters : Pocono Raceway - Chris Hill took
the pole in the Inters race and led the most laps on his way to victory. Sergey
Rebrov was 2nd while Steve Smith was 3rd. |
| 21 Oct 2009 - Trucks : Pocono Raceway - Jack Keithley took the pole for the
Truck race and dominated the race along with Chris Hill, the SRD boys leading 45 of
the 60 laps. Keithley won, with CJ in 2nd and Peter Andersson was 3rd. |
| 20 Oct 2009 - Lites : Pocono Raceway - David Bischoff took the poles for both Lites events at Pocono; he led all 10 laps to
win the Sprint ahead of Skullbone Todd and Gino Martens. The feature race featured
only 3 cautions. Skullbone Todd drove the #69 to victory lane, beating out Erwin
Greven and Jon Stiener, who led the most laps.
|
| 19 Oct 2009 - Inters : RICHMOND - Sadownik took his 3rd pole of the week as he
led the Inters race but Chris Hill completed a sweep of the L2 events with a win
ahead of Sadownik and Sergey Rebrov.
|
| 18 Oct 2009 - Trucks : RICHMOND - Steve Pearce grabbed
the pole for the Truck race, but an accident took him out after leading the most
laps. 9 of the 10 drivers led laps but Chris Hill led the last one to take the win,
ahead of Erik Gelotte and Steve Smith. |
| 17 Oct 2009 - Lites : RICHMOND INTERNATIONAL RACEWAY - Mike Sadownik took pole for the Lites Sprint race, leading 13 of 40 laps. However,
he lost the lead to #69 Skullbone Todd who raced to his 3rd win of the season.
Sadownik was 2nd, with Gino Martens in 3rd. Sadownik again led the field to the
green in the Feature race, leading the most laps en route to his 3rd Lites win in 4
races. Jon Stiener finished 2nd, with Martens in 3rd again. |
| 16 Oct 2009 - V8Thunder : LAS VEGAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY Round-up
#4 David Bischoff scored the pole for the Lites Sprint race, led all 27 laps and won
for the 9th time this season, beating #69 Skullbone Todd and #07 Gino Martens into
2nd and 3rd. Todd took pole for the Feature and led 29 laps, but this was only good
for 2nd as Bischoff swept the round with his 10th win of the season. #24 Mike
Cooper was 3rd and slipped to 150 points behind Bisch in the Standings.
#44 Jack Keithley once again led the field away for the Trucks race, #64 Mathieu
Souphy led the most laps (65) but was beaten into 2nd by the #44, Keithley taking
his 48th career win, extending his lead in the championship to 371 points over #09
Steve Smith, who finished 3rd. #95 Peter Andersson and #38 Erik Gelotte rounded out
the top 5. SRD extended their team series lead to 89 points over Team Ecosse.
Career pole #49 for the #44 Jack Keithley and he led the field on a story of SRD
dominance, as the team scored a 1-2-3-5 finish. #64 Mathieu Souphy took the
checkers, ahead of #14 Chris Hill, Keithley, independent #23 Carl Sundberg and #77
Andrew Jones. Team Ecosse still lead the standings despite fielding no cars at
Vegas, by 437 points. Keithley now leads the standings by 279 points and appears to
have both senior titles wrapped up.
|
02 Oct 2009 - V8Thunder : V8Thunder to use iRacing platform.
After 5 years of development, iRacing will shortly allow the running of League races on their servers and after a lot of consideration, the V8 Admin Team feel that the time is right now to venture away
 from Nascar Racing 2003 and modify the racing schedule to incorporate a iRacing Hosted Racing series into the V8Thunder portfolio.
The V8Thunder European Truck Series will start on Wednesday 25th November 2009 at the Lowes Motor Speedway, which is a base subscription track, for a 3 race mini series to be followed by a full 14 race series starting in January 2010. We will strive to keep individual costs as low as possible by running the initial series on as many of the regular iRacing Truck series and basic subscription tracks as possible, to compete you will need to have an active iRacing subscription which costs from $13 per month, there will be no additional costs (apart from the truck and some tracks) involved in racing at V8Thunder, we will not be charging entry fees but will continue to accept donations, any donations which exceed the cost of running the series and websites will be put into the series prize fund pot.
 The V8Thunder Truck Series will use the iRacing Chevrolet Silverado Truck, on Wednesday evening's at the normal V8Thunder race times. We understand that there is a persona of iRacing being expensive, it is not free that's for sure, but it's not overly expensive either. The V8 Admin Team will try and keep costs to a minimum.
If there is enough call, and enough entries (20 minimum) we may run an Inters series on Thursday's using the Nationwide car, or an Open Wheel series using the Dallara Indycar. Over time we do plan to expand the racing schedule, but initially we will only run one, maybe two series at the most per week.
The Truck Series will run as it is now, same scoring, same championships up for grabs, same rules, same Penalty Points system (although this may be modified to incorporate iRacing no fault Penalty Points system as well), the only thing different will be the software used to race, drivers and teams will still be able to select their number for the series, but this may differ during actual races due to the way the iRacing service issues numbers on a first come first served basis during sessions.
Full schedule, series sponsor and prize money details will follow shortly.
|
| 01 Oct 2009 - Inters : #14 Chris Hill was quickest in Qualifying for the Brickyard 200 at Indy, scoring his 31st pole in
V8 Thunder. However, he was the first of the 9 cars to retire, leading 3 laps
before wrecking out of the lead. 3 other drivers also led, with #64 Mathieu Souphy
leading 69 of the 80 laps. The caution flew twice in the first 100 miles, but then
it was a long clear run to the flag, with only 4 cars left and green flag pitstops.
Souphy pulled steadily away from the field on his way to victory lane, taking his
9th career win. #09 Steve Smith finished 2nd, 25 seconds back, with #77 Andrew
Jones 23 seconds behind him in 3rd. #23 Carl Sundberg was the only other finisher
in 4th, a lap down, while #47 Ben Parker retired with engine damage 51 laps from the
finish, classified 5th.
#44 Jack Keithley made 7 laps to finish 8th but still extended his lead over #12
Bjarne Laursen, who once again faced technical issues which prevented him from starting the race.
|
| 30 Sep 2009 - Trucks : #06 Ian Smiff was the quickest over 1 lap of the 2.5 mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway, taking career
pole #2 in his 114th start. 14 trucks took the green flag for the Brickyard 160, which
saw 2 yellows for 8 laps. 8 drivers led laps, #64 Mathieu Souphy led the most with
23 as the lead changed hands 15 times. This was a race for the SRD scrapbook, as
Souphy and championship leader #44 Jack Keithley ran away from the field, with
Keithley beating Souphy to the checkers by 0.54 seconds. #95 Peter Andersson was 19
seconds back in 3rd, with Team Ecosse duo #38 Erik Gelotte and #144 Derek Howe 22
seconds further back to complete the top 5.
Keithley extended his lead in the standings as #09 Steve Smith could only manage 7th while 3rd placed Smiff crashed at The Brickyard.
|
| 29 Sep 2009 - Lites : Sprint Race - #11 Mike Sadownik beat the field to the pole by half a second, his
first Lites race and his first V8 Thunder pole. 10 cars took the start for 24 laps
of “The Rectangle” and the tale was one of domination, as Sadownik led all the laps
and scored his first V8 Thunder win in the process. The only car close to
Sadownik's at the end was the #4, driven by David Bischoff, who finished just 0.49
seconds behind in 2nd. #140 George Sokolowski was 12 seconds further back in 3rd.
Feature Race - #07 Gino Martens topped the time-sheets as he scored career pole #7.
9 cars took the green flag to race the Indy 120. Over the course of the 48 laps, 4
cautions slowed the field for 16 laps and 7 drivers shared the lead on 8 occasions.
David Bischoff inched 5 points closer to the title by leading the most laps (13).
However, when the dust settled Bisch was 3rd in a 3 car battle for the lead, behind
#15 Ruben Hornacek, with Mike Sadownik taking the #11 back to victory lane, sweeping
the Lites Indy races.
The championship battle moved closer to being decided as Bischoff posted finishes of
2nd and 3rd, while #24 Mike Cooper could only manage 4th in the Sprint and 9th in
the Feature, falling further back as the title seems to Bischoff's to lose now,
unless the #24 team can race up a storm in the final races.
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