Round Three of the 2010 Independent Race Series is rapidly approaching, with just under three weeks until action gets underway.

iRace will visit the fast Eastern Creek layout for the first time on Friday 9 April. The event is an action packed one-day schedule, with qualifying and three races for all categories except Formula Tasman/LeMans Sports (which will have two longer races). The full schedule and supplementary regulations are available by clicking here, or use the buttons below.

The circuit will be available to unload cars/trailers on the afternoon immediately preceding the event (Thu 8 Apr) at a time to be confirmed, ensuring the action can get underway straight away on Friday morning.

Entries are now open, so head over to either the online entry system, or the printable form, to get your entry in now!

TV coverage of the latest round of the Independent Race Series from Morgan Park will screen on SBS Speedweek Sunday 4 April. The iRace segment will start at around 2pm, but as always, check your local TV guide to confirm.

The coverage will also appear on Fox Sports InsideSpeed, Wednesday 7 April.

Put it in your diary to make sure you don't miss any of the action!

The Independent Race Series visited Morgan Park on the weekend, and despite the early threat of monsoon conditions associated with Tropical Cyclone Ului, the conditions were fine and sunny, and the racing top class.

The Morgan Park facility and the friendly and accommodating volunteers and circuit staff fitted perfectly with iRace's brand of racing, and the relaxed, friendly atmosphere the series takes to every round.

Super Hoist Plus Production Racing Cars fielded a very strong grid, word-of-mouth spreading since the 2009 round, and the racing was close, fair and fun. Frank Donniaux maintained the upper hand over Anthony Soole in Class X, taking three of the four race wins, and winning a BlackBerry from BlackBerryStore.com.au in the process. In the V8 Class it was Daniel Flanagan who took the honours (despite a suspension drama causing a DNF in the final race). In Class A, Richard Mork was strongest, with Sean Soole taking out Class B, and winning the second BlackBerry. John Willmington, driving a Pulsar custom-made for the Morgan Park layout took out Class C (finishing ahead of almost all the Class B cars). Full Super Hoist Plus Production Racing Cars results are available here.

HDT Muscle Division and McHitch Touring Car Challenge were combined for this round, and the result was some action packed racing. Frank Donniaux joined the field in his Subaru WRX, and looked to be the early pace-setter, while Joe McGinnes was lifting wheels all over the place as he jetted around in his XY GT Falcon. Norm Stokes was consistently quick all day though, and proved that consistency counts for a lot in the handicap format by taking the McHitch Touring Car Challenge round win, ahead of McGinnes and Donniaux. In the Muscle Division, Rod Gurney drove some fantastic races to take the round win, ahead of Merrick Malouf and Maria Mare. Full McHitch Touring Car Challenge results here. Full HDT Muscle Division results here.

Formula Tasman was dominated by Chris Farrell in his 2001 Swift Formula Atlantic, but Farrell was kept honest in all races by Sam Dale in his Reynard 94D. Dale overcame early gearbox dramas to shadow Farrell all weekend, the pair setting their quickest times in Race 2, with 60.2 seconds for Farrell and 60.4 sec for Dale. Full Formula Tasman results here.

Robert Free looked like the early favourite in RocketSports, but a spin in the opening race, and an engine gremlin for the final race saw local boy Matt Clift take the honours. Free and Clift battled in every race, the most exciting tussle coming at the end of Race Three, where the pair swapped the lead repeatedly, with Clift just managing to get the upper hand at the flag. Adam Dodd, driving a Holden Roadster for the first time, managed to take second place for the round, with another local, John Woolcock taking third. Full RocketSports results here.

All in all a fantastic meeting, and enjoyed by all who attended. There's already some onboard video action available at onboard.irace.net.au, with more to be added soon thanks to Launch Helmet Cams. Look out for some photos in the gallery in the near future (in the meantime, click here to check out some great photos), and details of the TV coverage will be announced as soon as they are available.

Your next chance to get a dose of iRace action is in just under three weeks time! At the fantastic Eastern Creek, 9 April. Get your entries in now!

We're hosting another competition for those running at Round 2 at Morgan Park on our Facebook page.

To enter the competition, you need to:

• Visit the Launch Helmet Cams website (link on the front page of the iRace site).
• Find out the price of the VHoldR ContourHD.
• Post the price in the comments to competition post on the iRace Facebook page.

We will randomly select one of the correct entries to carry the Launch Helmet Cams VHoldR ContourHD at Morgan Park, with the footage featured on onboard.irace.net.au and possibly on Speedweek!

Additional conditions: the winner must be entered for Round 2, they must be a Facebook fan of iRace (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Independent-Race-Series/217908244004 ) and a member of the Launch Helmet Cams Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=96569660724 ). Good luck!

In another exciting announcement for the Independent Race Series, it can now be revealed that Blackberry Store has signed on as the Official Communications Partner for the iRace series in 2010.

Blackberry Store (www.blackberrystore.com.au) is the premium source for Blackberry Phones / PDAs including the new Blackberry Bold and an extensive range of Blackberry Accessories. Blackberry Store is based at North Ryde, in Sydney, but serves the whole of Australia through it's extensive online store. They offer the very best in phones and PDAs, and also offer comprehensive support, training and accessories.

The partnership will see Blackberry devices awarded to two Class winners in the Super Hoist Plus Production Racing Cars at each round. The prize will rotate between the different classes. To be in the running, Super Hoist Plus Production Racing Cars competitors will display Blackberry Store stickers either on the sides or front of their vehicle.

The Super Hoist Plus Production Racing Cars showcases a huge variety of production cars in action packed racing. The cars have only limited modifications from standard (most to enhance safety), but this only serves to make the action more fierce, as drivers in evenly matched machines battle it out for class honours. This new partnership will mean there is even more reward for taking the top spot.

The next round of the Independent Race Series will be held at Morgan Park, 20-21 March. Visit www.irace.net.au for more information.

Head to blackberrystore.com.au to see their great range of phones, PDAs and accessories on offer, and support the company that is supporting our series.

It's here, and it's totally free: iRacer, the iRace iPhone application.

Compatible with the iPhone and iPod touch, the application is available in the App Store now, completely free. The app allows you to keep up to date on the latest News, Results, Features, Photos and Classifieds from your compatible device.

Click the image on the right, or the button below to check it out on the App Store, or you can search for iRacer on the iTunes store.



For a little more info, you can check out the iRace App microsite at: app.irace.net.au

Thanks to our sponsors, supporters and competitors for making our ongoing innovation possible.

iRace is shooting for a big year in 2010, and with your support, we're already on our way.

• Round 1 was our biggest meeting yet, read the full report here. Check out all the multimedia here.
• TV coverage from Round 1 was made possible by Super Hoist Plus, McHitch.com.au and HDT. Check out the episode here. There are also some excellent excerpts from this episode, available here.
• We've got a ton of onboard video from Round 1, thanks to Launch Helmet Cams. Check out the video here, or on our Vimeo group here. You can share your videos too!
• We started a Facebook "Fan Page" in January, and we've just cracked the century, with 101 fans at the time of writing. If you use Facebook, check out the iRace page and become a fan (if you haven't already).
• We've also added a couple of feature articles to the website. A review of the VIO POV1.5 helmet/onboard camera, click here to view. And a (hopefully) simple explanation of how an anti roll bar works - read it here.

Which brings us to our next round. It's a little over a month away, and will be held at the awesome Morgan Park circuit 20-21 March. This track is fantastic as anyone who attended the round in 2009 will tell you. The round needs your support to make sure it is successful. Entries are open now, and you can enter online here, or download the form to mail or fax in here. Get behind the round, make the trip to Warwick, and encourage your mates to do the same!

Many of our competitors and supporters already know the answer to the question: What is iRace? But sometimes it can be challenging to pinpoint exactly what it is about the Independent Race Series that sets it apart from other forms of racing. Sometimes it's worthwhile being reminded exactly what it is that makes our series great.

Ultimately, what defines us is the things we care about. For iRace, it's a simple list:

• We care about safety.
• We care about each other.
• We care about driver development.
• We care about diversity.
• We care about affordability.
• We care about our supporters.

Read on for a short explanation of each point.

We care about safety.

We strive hard to make our racing as safe as possible. Our marshalls and officials have excellent training, and safety is their number one priority. Our regulations focus on ensuring that racecars are as safe as possible, and we conduct regular checks for compliance.

We care about each other.

Our series is all about mate-against-mate. We encourage hard racing, but insist that drivers put themselves in the other guys shoes, and treat their fellow competitors the way they would like to be treated. We also help each other out if there is work to be done to get a car back on track.

We care about driver development.

Often racing can become a procession. Not in our series. We employ a variety of different race formats (handicap, reverse grid, rolling starts) to ensure that drivers in our series learn as much about racecraft as possible, and practice a variety of techniques that give them a headstart over other drivers.

We care about diversity.

We have many different kinds of cars and drivers in our series. There is a place for all of them. We have carefully designed our categories to cater for as many different cars as possible, and to offer something for the casual racer, and for the driver who has their sights set on the top.

We care about affordability.

Racing costs money. But with the right strategy, the amount of money can be kept to a minimum. Our series has evolved to offer the lowest cost possible. We’ve thought outside the box, and scheduled some of our events on a Friday. All in the interests of keeping our entry fees fixed at $395.

We care about our supporters.

Our supporters help make our series happen. We work hard to make sure series, category and individual team sponsors get as much exposure as possible. Prosperity for our supporters means prosperity for our series. What’s good for them is good for us!

To download a PDF poster of this information, please click here. Please feel free to pass it on to your friends and competitors!

Attention competitors! We would like to feature your onboard videos on www.irace.net.au

We know a number of you have your own onboard cameras, and no doubt there's plenty of great footage from Round 1 - the last EVER race meeting at Oran Park. So if you're willing to share it, we'd love to feature it.

If you've already uploaded your video to a video sharing website, we just need the link (send it in here). If you haven't uploaded any video yet, then we're recommending Vimeo. Follow the simple procedure below to add your video to the Independent Race Series group on Vimeo:

1. Create a free Vimeo account (if you already have one, you can skip this step). Just go to www.vimeo.com and select "Join vimeo". Or we've made it easy for you, just click the button below!

2. Go the Independent Race Series Vimeo group page: www.vimeo.com/groups/irace, click on "Join this group".

3. Then on the Independent Race Series group click on the "Upload Video" button. Again, we've made it easy for you, just click on the button below!

4. Click "Choose a file to upload", and then find the video on your hard drive (or you can even upload it straight from your camera if it's plugged in!), and then fill in some information about it. Don't close your browser or leave the Vimeo page until the video has finished uploading. Once it's complete, it will automatically appear in the iRace Vimeo group, and once we see it, we'll embed it on "User Videos".

We selected Vimeo because of the very high quality playback, and the fact that our competitors can upload video for free, and automatically add it to the Independent Race Series group.

We look forward to seeing all your great videos!

If you don't have a camera yet, consider our Official Onboard and Helmet Camera Partner - Launch Helmet Cams.

See below for a selection of the videos uploaded so far! To see the videos in all their high def glory, go to onboard.irace.net.au or check out the Vimeo group by clicking here.

The TV coverage from Round One is set to go to air as follows:

• SBS Speedweek - 31 Jan - 1pm
• FOX InsideSpeed - 3 Feb
• FOX Full Noise - 4 Feb
• FOX Speedweek - 10 Feb

Please note that all FOX dates are subject to change, and as always, check your local guides to confirm air times in your area.

Thank you to Super Hoist Plus, HDT and McHitch, who help make the TV possible.

Round Two of the Independent Race Series will be held at Morgan Park, 20-21 March. The entry form is available here.