Picking up right where he left off, the 2022 iRacing World of Outlaws ButtKicker Late Model Series Champion Evan Seay had a dominant start to the 2023 season at Volusia Speedway Park on Monday night (July 10). From the pole position, obtained by both qualifying fastest and winning the first Heat race, Seay pulled off a perfect score, leading every lap he was a part of and scoring maximum points. Barrett Bishop, Kendal Tucker, Tanner Tomasi and 2019 champion Blake Matjoulis rounded out the Top 5.
A format unlike any other in the iRacing eSports scene, the World of Outlaws features Heat races to set the grid for the main event, not too different than how the real-world World of Outlaws series does it. In the eSports version, the Top 4 finishers in each Heat race advance to the Feature, which is made up of a 20-car field. With four Heat races filling 16 slots, the remaining four after that are taken from the two Last Chance Qualifying races, the Top 2 finishers from each of those moving on, everyone else eliminated.
Each Heat race pays out eight points to the winner, down to eighth place, who gets a single point. With 35 drivers in the series, that means three of the four heats have nine drivers, and those ninth place finishers get no points. As for the Feature, the winner takes home 70 points, every spot after that down to 10th separated by three points and every spot from 11th on down separated by two points.
Seay won the pole and went on to handedly win the first Heat. In the second Heat, Barrett Bishop lost the lead early to Tanner Tomasi and had Talan Willis up his tail. Bishop managed to take back the lead just in time on the final lap to win and take the outside pole position for the Feature. Heat 3 saw Kendal Tucker victorious from the pole, as did Heat 4 with James Edens. The C-Main, the first of the two Last Chance Qualifying races, saw Dylan Yeager break through after narrowly missing the transfer in Heat 1, advancing alongside Travis StClair. The final LCQ had Robbie Buchanan Jr and Damian Kiefer join the Feature grid.
The Feature was mostly green, sans a first lap incident that involved a few in the mid-pack. Seay took the restart to begin the second lap and never looked back, winning by over 1.8 seconds. 17 cars finished on the lead lap and every single lap was led by the 2022 Series Champion. Despite getting caught up in the opening lap melee, Dylan Wilson was the biggest mover of the race, finishing in seventh after starting in 13th. Chase Barbara was also caught up in that opening lap fracas, unfortunately losing the most spots of anyone on the night with a 19th place finish from the ninth starting spot.
iRacing World of Outlaws ButtKicker Late Model Series Round 1 results at Volusia were as follows:
| Fin. | St. | No. | Driver | Laps | Interval | Led | Best | Pts. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 33 | Evan Seay | 50 | 0.000 | 49 | 16.269 | 78 |
| 2 | 2 | 3 | Barrett Bishop | 50 | -1.845 | 0 | 16.261 | 75 |
| 3 | 3 | 00 | Kendal Tucker | 50 | -1.893 | 0 | 16.232 | 72 |
| 4 | 6 | 09 | Tanner Tomasi | 50 | -2.079 | 0 | 16.295 | 68 |
| 5 | 5 | 127 | Blake Matjoulis | 50 | -2.274 | 0 | 16.224 | 65 |
| 6 | 4 | 52 | James Edens | 50 | -6.216 | 0 | 16.304 | 63 |
| 7 | 13 | 80 | Dylan Wilson | 50 | -6.390 | 0 | 16.349 | 57 |
| 8 | 10 | 10 | Talan Willis | 50 | -6.413 | 0 | 16.408 | 55 |
| 9 | 7 | 91 | Payton Stevenson | 50 | -6.780 | 0 | 16.382 | 53 |
| 10 | 11 | 16 | Kaden Honeycutt | 50 | -9.242 | 0 | 16.379 | 49 |
| 11 | 14 | 41 | Logan Rumsey2 | 50 | -9.854 | 0 | 16.398 | 46 |
| 12 | 17 | 48 | Dylan Yeager | 50 | -10.163 | 0 | 16.347 | 43 |
| 13 | 8 | 999 | Dylonn Fox | 50 | -10.315 | 0 | 16.324 | 44 |
| 14 | 16 | 14 | JD Brown | 50 | -15.360 | 0 | 16.510 | 40 |
| 15 | 19 | 13 | Travis StClair | 50 | -16.878 | 0 | 16.560 | 37 |
| 16 | 15 | 20 | Colton Zimmer | 50 | -17.007 | 0 | 16.493 | 36 |
| 17 | 18 | 31 | Robbie Buchanan Jr | 50 | -17.204 | 0 | 16.447 | 33 |
| 18 | 12 | 92 | Tristan Ladouceur | 49 | -1L | 0 | 16.562 | 33 |
| 19 | 9 | 23 | Chase Barbara | 31 | -19L | 0 | 16.545 | 31 |
| 20 | 20 | 21 | Damian Kiefer | 22 | DNF | 0 | 16.599 | 27 |
iRacing World of Outlaws ButtKicker Late Model Series points through Round 1 are as follows::
- Evan Seay, 78
- Barrett Bishop, 75
- Kendal Tucker, 72
- Tanner Tomasi, 68
- Blake Matjoulis, 65
- James Edens, 63
- Dylan Wilson, 57
- Talan Willis, 55
- Payton Stevenson, 53
- Kaden Honeycutt, 49
Leaving Volusia, the iRacing World of Outlaws ButtKicker Late Model Series next heads to Fairbury Speedway for its second round of the season on Monday, July 17. Last year’s visit to Fairbury ended in a photo finish, with Hayden Cardwell taking the checkers just ahead of Seay. Tune in live for the show starting at 9PM ET on DirtVision and at twitch.tv/iracing.
For more information on the iRacing World of Outlaws ButtKicker Late Model Series, visit www.iracing.com/woolm. 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.
