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Twenty-four racers took part in the first of two summer WHO Digital Nascar & Legends evenings at the Barn. We welcomed James T for his first taste of digital, with Simon M joining us for his first full evening of the WHO digital experience. We raced on a slightly tweaked version of the track Simon designed for our evening in February and proved a great layout for novices and experienced drivers alike...

   

As always, six teams were put together with a mix of young racers, top seeds and less experienced drivers. Six teams of four would race three 20-minute segments, swapping cars each time - the winners swapping with the sixth place team etc.

Segment One saw Ryan, Rob, Pete and Simon M tie with Ollie, Terry, Kev and Duncan with 87 laps, but it was Ryan's team that took the initiative in the middle segment. A huge 91 lap run with the red car gave them a five lap advantage over Ollie's quartet and seven laps ahead of Jerome, Andy, Stephen Mc and Kevin G. Those were the only team with a chance of the win going into the final 20 minutes...

   

The concluding segment was a close-run thing. The winners of the 20-minutes were Oliver, Simon C, Mike Mc and Rob A, equal on 90 lap with Ollie's team. However, Ryan, Rob B, Pete and Simon M rolled in just a lap behind, wrapping up the race by four laps...

   

Congrats to the winners, especially as they had one of our two new drivers! And well done to all the teams on yet another excellent Nascar team race...

         

         

         

Next was the Legends pairs race...

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Eleven Pioneer Legends gave us a frantic format - two qualifying heats, the best 5 pairs going through and the other six fighting over one step-up to the Feature race. A recipe for complete carnage? We'd soon find out... With not quite enough cars to go round, Simon M and Stephen A sat this one out, but would enjoy the spectacle and help with marshalling.

   

The six-car Heat One was quick and would ultimately provide four of the five qualifiers. At the top, Oliver & Terry hit 43 laps in the eight minutes, stopping twice. Simon & Duncan rolled in second with 41, followed on 40 laps by two father-son combos of Pete & Jerome and John & Alex. 

   

Ryan & Matthew were the front-runners in Heat Two, qualifying for the Feature with 41 laps. However, Mike & Ash failed to do so, although managing 40 laps, their fastest time wasn't enough. They would join everyone else in a full-on 8-minute Semi-Final...

   

The Semi was a fabulous race, Ollie & Rob setting the pace and being pursued by Mike & Ash and in the latter stages by Rob & Andy. Rob kept his cool, bringing the green McDonald's car home a lap ahead of a photo-finish between Ash & Andy - the #55 Perrier car grabbing second by no more than a coat of paint. However, that was just for pride - Ollie & Rob were going to the Feature race.

   

This was even more exciting - and with a race win up for grabs. Simon led in the early stages, having got the jump on the pole-sitters. Ryan sat second and Terry third, with a small gap back to Pete in fourth, John in fifth and Ollie in sixth. Ryan was first to pit, a quarter of the way through the race. Terry took fuel and Soft tyres, leaving him third behind Simon and Ryan, who just taken fuel. And that's how it stayed at the driver change pit stop.

Oliver grabbed another pair of Softs at the hand-over, also topping up with fuel. With three minutes to go, he led the race - although he'd need to stop again for tyres. Duncan was close behind, although Matthew had lost a bit of ground. That soon turned to disaster for Matthew & Ryan as their car failed, Jerome moving up to third, Alex to fourth and Rob to fifth. 

Oliver's pit stop with two minutes to go handed the lead back to Duncan. Oliver could now got to the end, but could Duncan? It was going to be close. Jerome had just run out of fuel, letting Alex through into third. What was Duncan going to do? More pressure was added when the lead car got tangled up in someone else's crash, ending up on the floor. Duncan would need to splash and dash, but when he dived into the pits with a minute to go, he changed tyres as well. That let Oliver through and in the sixty-second chase that followed, it was pursuer that made the errors, the eventual winning margin of two laps really not telling the story of the race...

Congrats to Oliver & Terry on their win!

   

And here are the results...

   

A big thank you to everyone who came along for another excellent evening at the Barn. Special thanks go to the set-up crew and race control team and everyone who stayed behind to pack away - we couldn't do it without you!

We're back for our final Nascar & Legends event of the year and we will crown our 2025 Nascar team race and Legends champions.