Story and Images by David Anderson

December 12th, 2023 – The 2024 Champion Motorsports iRacing Team Endurance Series (iRTES) is underway for our fourth consecutive season and we could not have gotten off to a more exciting and big start with 57 cars gridded at Daytona International Raceway for race 1 of the 6 race Championship. A thrilling race at Daytona broadcast by Apex Simracing TV and sponsored by Penguin r/c Simulation and simrace247.com did not disappoint with great on track action throughout.

Taking top honors in the race overall was the Satellite Racing Teal team.  This season Satellite is back in the series full-time after a break in 2023.  They will be fielding 2 cars and look to reclaim their position on top of the Championship. Having won the 2021 and 2022 Championships in the top class the team picked up right where they left on in seasons past with a great win in somewhat dominant fashion by over 25 seconds on the field in LMDh Pro. The car driven by Max Muir and Jesse Lyon will surely be a contender at the top of the series all season long.  Max has shown dominance in the CMS Weds Night GT3 Series and Jesse comes with high aclaim and success from the Porsche PCA Simracing community.

Satellite Racing Teal takes the overall win at Daytona and P1 in LMDh Pro Category (above)

Within the LMDh Am Category JT Tami the team owner for PNUMatik Motorsports Purple had to scramble less than 24 hours before the green flag to deal with adversity.  A last minute issue prevented the normal driver lineup from gridding and JT and James Stacey (last minute fill in) would have to do the race.  Luckily and despite no practice James had 4 hours of racing to get to grips with the car at a track he was familiar with and the team stayed calm and focused despite their off track challenges leading up to the green to lead most all the way and take the win.  A huge shot in the arm for Jason Lundy and his overall ownership of PNUMatik motorsports to see this team start strong in 2024.

The JT Tami owned PNUMatik Motorsports Purple Team drive their Porsche GTP to a victory in LMDh AM category at Daytona (above)

Dan Fendick and Fendi Motorsports have entered a large stable of 6 cars in the iRTES 2024 Championship and have put major investment into the series and their commitment.  Series officials at CMS have repeatedly stated how excited they are to see the series draw the attention of such a great endurance stable and the OVRTK 2 team would start off with a big splash and make team Principle Fendick very happy with their first win in series history and in the 2024 season.  Leading most of the way with a dominant display of pace and strength this Mercedes GT3 driven by Viktor Lind and Zain Khan shot an immediate one over the bow to tell everyone they are here and mean business in the series.

OVRTK Racing 2 Takes their first win in iRTES series history with an amazing drive in GT3 Pro Category (above)

Perhaps the best race of the day and the most heart warming story was to see Longhorn Racing the team owned by Larry Ford take their first series win in iRTES after being mainstays in the grid all four seasons.  Longhorn has 2 cars in the GT Am category this year and Larry paired up with Brett Stephens showed an incredible amount of race craft and resolve to take a thrilling win in the most competitive battle in the race amongst the GT3 Am teams.  The win was popular in the Paddock as Larry in the 50+ category and an early member of CMS from the late 90’s would get to victory lane for the first time in quite a few years and able to relish a very special win.  The team now leading the Championship early and Larry leading the 50+ drivers category gets Longhorn off to an amazing start this season that we are excited to follow.

Larry Ford and Brett Stephens with Longhorn Racing team take their first series and season win in GT3 Am at Daytona a great effort by these veterans (above)

Full Race Broadcast Replay

Race Results

Available Here

Point Standings

Available Here

Next up we will be at Jerez on January 7th after we all enjoy a great holiday break.  What is sure to be an exciting event it will be the first time that CMS has visited the track in iRTES competition.

Series officials also released a schedule update for 2024 with adjusted dates for Rounds 5 and 6 and Le Mans and Silverstone

A special thanks to all of our drivers , team owners, and members of Champion Motorsports for helping us get off to an amazing start in our Flagship Series.  Cya on the Track!