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2020 was a rough year for many of us, many of the things we were so accustomed to doing were put on pause, rescheduled, or canceled. 2020 was also a very tough year for racing, with in-person racing in limbo in walked eNASCAR. After a successful and much-needed debut season that set the high watermark in viewership for televised esports programming, the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series is set to return in 2021.<\/p>\n
NASCAR and iRacing jointly announced an all new-look Pro Invitational that will showcase NASCAR Cup Series stars who will compete virtually in a 10-race schedule that will complement NASCAR\u2019s real-life racing schedule, offering fans a new mid-week competition featuring NASCAR\u2019s top drivers. FOX Sports, who played a pivotal role in setting viewership records for NASCAR and iRacing with the inaugural Pro Invitational last season, will broadcast the first five races of the series live in primetime on FS1. NBC Sports will air the final five races of the series, with its schedule and details to be announced at a later date.<\/p>\n
With the NASCAR Cup Series set to visit new tracks and new markets in 2021, this year\u2019s Pro Invitational will feature a mix of tracks designed primarily to focus on the upcoming weekend\u2019s \u201creal life\u201d race \u2013 a feature that will be particularly beneficial in giving fans an idea of what to expect as the real-life drivers take on challenging new circuits throughout the season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe success of our eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series was underscored by an industry-wide effort to entertain fans during the early months of the global pandemic,\u201d said Tim Clark, NASCAR senior vice president and chief digital officer. \u201cThis year the Pro Invitational will return with\u00a0a schedule of midweek races that will bridge the gap between our real-world races each weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n
“After last year’s Pro Invitational success, we\u2019re proud that our partners at NASCAR, FOX, and the race teams view the series as an integral part of their marketing and fan engagement strategies for 2021,\u201d said Steve Myers, iRacing executive producer. \u201cIt\u2019s even more fulfilling\u00a0that the industry has rallied around our platform not only as the most authentic re-creation of the sport, but also a terrific tool to help grow NASCAR\u2019s audience and generate revenue to strengthen the entire ecosystem.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first five mid-week events will air on FS1 on select Wednesday nights beginning March 24th<\/sup>, featuring an exciting mix of races that include Bristol Motor Speedway\u2019s new dirt configuration, fan-favorites such as Talladega Superspeedway and Darlington Raceway, and Austin, Texas\u2019 famed Circuit of the Americas\u2019 facility. NBC Sports will pick up the second half of the 10-race season once the network\u2019s broadcast window begins in June.<\/p>\n \u201cFOX Sports embraced the eNASCAR iRacing Invitational Series in the spring as a way to keep race fans entertained, but we quickly realized it was a product and collaboration that we would continue to explore,\u201d said FOX Sports Executive Producer, EVP\/Head of Operations and Production Brad Zager. \u201cThe product is best-in-class, it delivers NASCAR to an even broader audience and, let\u2019s face it, it\u2019s a heckuva lot of fun.\u201d<\/p>\n Details around the fifth race in the FS1 window, plus further plans for the second half of the \u201921 Pro Invitational schedule, will be announced at a later date.<\/p>\n For more information on the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series, along with other esports initiatives, visit\u00a0www.eNASCAR.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n After a successful and much-needed debut season that set the high watermark in viewership for televised esports programming, the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series is set to return in 2021.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":70385,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[17,3424,3470,5029,22],"tags":[7658,3083,5210,41,7617,1632,8020],"class_list":["post-77682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-column","category-nascar","category-news","category-racing","category-event-coverage","tag-enascar","tag-fox-sports","tag-iracing","tag-news","tag-pro-invtational","tag-racing","tag-virtual-race"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/eNASCAR-ProInvitational_iRacingSeries_Logo-scaled-1-e1584989541580.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-kcW","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77682"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77682\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77685,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77682\/revisions\/77685"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n\n
\n 2021 eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series (First Five-Races)<\/strong><\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Date<\/strong><\/td>\n Venue<\/strong><\/td>\n Network<\/strong><\/td>\n Time (ET)<\/strong><\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Wednesday, March 24<\/td>\n Bristol – Dirt<\/td>\n FS1<\/td>\n 8-9:30 p.m.<\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Wednesday, April 21<\/td>\n Talladega<\/td>\n FS1<\/td>\n 7-8:30 p.m.<\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Wednesday, May 5<\/td>\n Darlington<\/td>\n FS1<\/td>\n 8-9:30 p.m.<\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Wednesday, May 19<\/td>\n COTA<\/td>\n FS1<\/td>\n 7-8:30 p.m.<\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Wednesday, June 2<\/td>\n Track-TBD<\/td>\n FS1<\/td>\n 8-9:30 p.m.<\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"