FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, April 22nd, 2020
INDYCAR iRACING CHALLENGE CONTINUES LIVE THIS SATURDAY ON NBCSN AT 2:30 P.M. ET FROM VIRTUAL CIRCUIT OF THE AMERICAS
Leigh Diffey, Paul Tracy and Townsend Bell to Call Saturday’s Event, with Marty Snider Providing Reports from ‘Pit Road’
Event to Stream on NBCSports.com and the NBC Sports App
STAMFORD, Conn. – April 22, 2020 – NBC Sports will present Round 5 of the INDYCAR iRacing Challenge live this Saturday at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN, as more than two dozen INDYCAR drivers compete at the virtual Circuit of the Americas.
Drivers expected to compete on the 3.427-mile, 20-turn virtual road course include five-time series champion Scott Dixon, two-time and reigning series champion Josef Newgarden, 2018 Indianapolis 500 winner Will Power, and Robert Wickens, who has returned to competition as part of his ongoing recovery from a spinal cord injury suffered in an August 2018 racing accident. McLaren Formula 1 driver Lando Norris is also expected to compete.
Last Saturday, reigning Indianapolis 500 winner Simon Pagenaud earned his second straight victory in Round 4 of the INDYCAR iRacing Challenge at virtual Twin Ring Motegi on NBCSN. Dixon finished runner-up, and Power rounded out the top three finishers.
The real-world COTA, located in Austin, Texas, hosted its inaugural NTT INDYCAR Series race in March 2019. Colton Herta, son of former driver and current team owner Bryan Herta, took the checkered flag to become the youngest winner ever in Indy-car history at 18 years, 11 months, 25 days old.
Including this weekend, the final two INDYCAR iRacing Challenge events (Rounds 5 and 6) will be presented on the next two Saturdays at 2:30 p.m. ET live on NBCSN. The final event will be at a track to be announced in the near future.
NBC Sports’ lead INDYCAR broadcast team of Leigh Diffey (play-by-play), Paul Tracy (analyst), and Townsend Bell (analyst) will call the action, with Marty Snider providing reports throughout the telecast.
A replay of Saturday’s race will be available on-demand on NBC Sports Gold’s INDYCAR Pass, which is currently free for a limited time. Click here for more information.
This marks the latest collaboration between NBC Sports and iRacing, whose partnership began in 2019 with NBCSN broadcasting the first-ever eNASCAR live event on television. Since then, further collaborations have included a two-hour live broadcast of the 2019 eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series Championship race, and the broadcast of the inaugural NBC eSports Short Track iRacing Challenge in April 2020.
–NBC SPORTS–
