Doesn’t it feel wonderful to have actual racing to talk about? I know some of you were outright forced to watch the Oscars Sunday night as some kind of penance by significant others due to the action on Sunday. As far as Sunday is concerned, I’m happy no one got hurt and a decreased amount of equipment got smashed. Also, the final 20 laps had me nervous as heck.
Before we get to the nitty gritty, there are two news items to address. Firstly, FOX Sports announced on Saturday that they have acquired the services of a fourth Sprint Cup driver to serve as an analyst at the XFINITY Series race at Michigan International Speedway in June. That driver is Danica Patrick, who will now join Jeff Gordon, Brad Keselowski and Saturday’s booth debutante, Kevin Harvick. While the move is likely groundbreaking (Patrick would not be the first female booth analyst on a race broadcast (that honor goes to Lyn St. James for her work on IMSA broadcasts in the 1980’s), but likely the first on a NASCAR race broadcast), I don’t know how Patrick’s skills will adapt to the booth. I actually find her fairly boring. While that doesn’t necessarily mean anything as far as performance goes, I’m skeptical how it’s going to work out. Granted, we’re talking about something that will happen almost four months from now, but I’ll keep a close eye on Patrick when she makes her debut.
Secondly, for our Canadian readers (and I know I have some), FOX Sports re-launched the former Canadian feed of SPEED (SPEED International) as FOX Sports Racing on Friday. If you’re lucky enough to get it (availability is quite limited at the moment), you’ll be able to get all the NASCAR action that airs on FOX Sports 1 and 2 here in the United States, including some of the Cup races, all but one of the Camping World Truck Series events and a good chunk of the first half of the XFINITY Series season. Unfortunately, that means that you would still miss out on Cup races that air on FOX if you don’t live near the U.S./Canada border. The NBC half of the Cup/XFINITY season is also still a question. Don’t thrust that pelvis just yet. Maybe a quarter of a thrust at best.
Daytona 500
For NASCAR, the Daytona 500 is the most important race of the year, for many reasons. Everything has to go off without a hitch. As last year showed, any delay in the race will have a snowball effect through much of the season. Luckily, Daytona had a perfect day on Sunday. The action was fast and furious.
For 2015, FOX has renamed their pre-race show FOX NASCAR Sunday, once again following behind FOX’s NFL coverage. The whole self-promotional behavior was on full display in pre-race once again. Someone came up with the idea of starting the show with a short piece about Michael Waltrip doing Dancing with the Stars, then showing a clip of Darrell Waltrip at the National Prayer Breakfast. First off, someone has a bizarre definition of “the offseason” since that clearly occurred last season. Seriously, who gives a tuchis about Michael Waltrip doing Dancing with the Stars now? There was infinitely more important stuff that should had been covered before Michael’s dancing excursion. Afterwards, they did start talking about the Kyle Busch crash and the aftermath. Either that story or the ongoing Kurt Busch fiasco should have led the show, not Michael Waltrip failing at dancing or Darrell Waltrip trying to get a cheap pop from the crowd.
On the positive side, the piece where various drivers talked about Jeff Gordon was really interesting. It just goes to show how the cream of the sport revere Gordon. Many people who will read this remember when Gordon was the college-aged racer with the mullet and questionable mustache that came on the scene at age 21. For some, their introduction to Gordon was when he started third in the 1993 Daytona 500 and CBS showed a brief clip of him playing a racing game on the SEGA Genesis prior to the start. We’re talking about a man that is almost universally liked and revered, which is a far cry from how he was perceived in the 1990’s. It’s amazing when you really think about it.
Naturally, FOX is going to use the Daytona 500 as a showcase for the latest and greatest. On Sunday, that included a prodigious use of tread cams (formerly Digger Cams) and some distracting graphical elements, like showing the wind. Quite unnecessary.
We finally got to see how FOX plans on using Andy Petree on the broadcasts. It’s more or less how I envisioned it. They brought him in a couple of times on the telecast and had him break down some of the penalties from the Hollywood Hotel. As previously announced, FOX has access to the Hawkeye cameras that are part of NASCAR’s electronic officiating system. We did see some of those shots during the race, such as when Jimmie Johnson’s crew got busted for going over the wall too quick. Having the first pit stall is pretty much useless now. Knowing that the other races during Speedweeks just had the booth handle the officiating stuff, I don’t really see the benefit of having Petree there. As I mentioned in previous columns, it’s too cut and dry in the pits now with the camera bank of doom. Petree’s role would have worked better last year. It seems like he doesn’t need to be in Daytona and could probably do his work from Charlotte.
Even with 74 cameras in the production (not including the aforementioned camera bank of doom), FOX still missed a number of important instances late in the race. For nearly 15 laps, there was a large pack of three-by-three-by-three racing all the way back to nearly 30th. Then, the field split in half. Why? If you weren’t paying undivided attention to the race, then you wouldn’t have known, because they never mentioned it at all. A rather obvious whiff. On lap 195, you could see Justin Allgaier essentially wipe out in turn 4 and hit Ty Dillon in the side. While both drivers recovered and continued, it ultimately resulted in the final caution a couple of laps later. Others had to take evasive action as well, splitting the pack in the process. Darrell Waltrip sort of mentioned it, but was vague in his commentary. Given his normal style of commentary, I couldn’t discern whether he was talking about the incident, or if he was just speaking in jacked up generics.
When the inevitable crash occurred when both Allgaier and Ty Dillon had tire failures, FOX all but missed it. All we got was Allgaier smoking off in the distance about a half a lap before the crash with the booth clueless as to what happened, then he wrecked in the tri-oval and we only got the end of the wreck in replays as if it were 1986. Weak. FOX definitely could have been better there.
Post-race coverage was decent. We got interviews, analysis and results. However, Sunday was clearly not FOX’s best broadcast of the weekend.
Alert Today Florida 300
Saturday’s XFINITY Series race at Daytona, despite all the carnage and ridiculousness, will likely be overshadowed by the absolutely nasty hit that Kyle Busch took on the inside wall on lap 112.
The broadcast booth instantly realized that Kyle Busch had taken a bad hit and focused their attention to the wreck. I personally could have done without the shots of Samantha Busch freaking out, but I understand why they were there. While FOX Sports is generally a fun-loving bunch, they knew that that was the time to buckle down.
Larry McReynolds, who was spending the race in the Hollywood Hotel, did not pull any punches. He railed on Daytona International Speedway (and by extension, NASCAR, since the France family has a controlling stake in the International Speedway Corporation, Daytona International Speedway’s parent company) for not having a SAFER barrier there, which needed to be said. Admittedly, I can only recall someone hitting that wall once. It was in 1980, and it was fatal. We’re not going to link to the video of that crash here. It’s ugly. It’s on YouTube if you wish to observe.
Thankfully, Joie Chitwood stated that the speedway was going to create a temporary solution for the Daytona 500 in a press conference, and they did. The solution for Sunday was the same solution they use for the Rolex 24. There’s a reason they had 850 tires just hanging around. I’d argue that the result of the permanent renovations will see not only SAFER Barriers on that inside wall, but also a redesign of the wall itself. Currently, it juts out like the inside wall at Talladega in Papyrus’ NASCAR Racing 2003 Season for the PC, which creates the potential for hits at acute angles. Expect some kind of temporary wall blocking the exit of the infield road course as well to lessen any acute angles of impact.
With that said, Saturday also saw the debut of Kevin Harvick in the broadcast booth. Of the three champion analysts that were originally announced by FOX Sports, Harvick was the one that I really didn’t know what to expect out of. It could have gone either way. However, unlike previous occasions with Cup drivers freelancing as broadcasters, it seems like FOX Sports has done something different here. They’ve actually trained the drivers on how to actually be an analyst. Believe it or not, it’s more than describing things.
If you remember when ESPN had Carl Edwards working as an analyst a couple of years ago, they threw him out there with little training and it showed, blatantly at times. On the other hand, Harvick came off as very prepared, engaging and informative in the broadcast booth. That’s really everything I want from a booth analyst. For instance, after Ryan Reed won the race, Harvick talked about Reed’s racing past and racing against Reed’s father, Mark Reed, out on the west coast (Reed, like Harvick, is from Bakersfield). I don’t think ESPN mentioned the fact that Reed’s family had any racing heritage, let alone that Ryan’s father competed in what’s now the K&N Pro Series West and started two Cup races the whole time that Reed’s been in the series (I didn’t even realize it myself, although I had heard of his father’s name previously). It’s similar to the fact that many race fans don’t know that Timmy Hill is the son of former racer Jerry Hill. If performances like what we saw from Harvick on Saturday will be the norm with the championship analysts, then FOX Sports seems to have hit on something that will set their XFINITY Series broadcasts apart. If Patrick ends up being as good as Harvick was on Saturday in June, even better.
The only downside to having the championship analysts that it might be a little difficult for Adam Alexander and Michael Waltrip to get into the proper groove in the booth due to the constant turnover.
Having said all that, I did have a couple of minor gripes with the broadcast. They were mostly graphical in nature and based around the whole idea of there not being such a thing as too much information. We’re talking not notifying viewers well enough about who came off pit road first and similar issues. On Saturday, the good definitely outweighed the bad. Even with Michael Waltrip hanging around.
NextEra Energy Resources 250
Friday night saw a wreck-happy Camping World Truck Series race from Daytona. With the decreased field size and the Big One, a rather depleted group sauntered home. At least we got a decent finish, but was FOX on par for everything else?
The revamped NCWTS Setup has Danielle Trotta hosting along with Todd Bodine. While I’ll miss having Krista Voda here, I think the Bodine-Trotta pairing is going to work out just fine. The duo seem to work well together, although I wish Bodine were in the booth instead of Michael Waltrip.
FOX’s coverage of the Camping World Truck Series always seems to have the best features of NASCAR’s National series. It’s a fact that I find somewhat strange, but viewers should be happy to have it. In his new role for 2015, Ray Dunlap went one-on-one with Rick Crawford in a catch-up feature. Crawford just seems like an interesting chap in general. For those of you who are longtime Frontstretch readers, you might remember that we had a driver diary with Crawford a number of years ago.
The other feature talked about the long-term racing relationship between defending champion Matt Crafton and crew chief Carl Joiner, Jr. (also known as Junior Joiner). On paper, the Crafton-Joiner relationship appears to be similar to what Matt Kenseth and Robbie Reiser had (former competitors on short tracks that joined forces later on). Very interesting.
Until Steve Byrnes is healthy enough to return, Camping World Truck Series broadcasts will have a bit of a revolving door in the booth. Mike Joy did play-by-play Friday night and the result was a different feel than what viewers have come to expect with truck races. It’s not a bad thing to be sure, but you never know what you’re going to get this year.
The coverage of the Big One at the halfway point was both good and bad. At the time it happened, FOX Sports 1 was in a commercial, but they broke out of it early to show the wreck. There was a lot of confusion as to what started the wreck. Ben Kennedy was slow, but he had his own problems. Seems like it was just a chain reaction. At least we got some decent interviews that allowed viewers to piece everything together. Afterwards, the race turned into the Debris 250. I’m shocked there was only one debris caution Friday night. There easily could have been four or five with all the bare bond around.
I’m still at a loss as to why FOX chooses not to use side-by-side replays on the Sprint Cup telecasts. They work out really nice, yet they prefer to go full screen and obtrusive for Cup races. Stuff can still happen during those breaks. On the truck telecasts (Friday night’s being no exception), they’ll use side-by-side replays in order to not break up the overall flow of the race. As far as I’m concerned, it’s the best way to go.
Post-race coverage was decent. We got interviews with the top 5 finishers, including Ray Black, Jr., (I still have no idea how the heck he was allowed to keep his fifth-place finish after blatantly going below the yellow line). As you would expect, Black was overjoyed with his run and it’s always great to see that emotion on broadcasts. However, that was all we got since the telecast was tight against FOX Sports Live, which continues to irritate me with their cutting into post-race coverage.
That’s all for this week. Next weekend, all three of NASCAR’s National series travel to Georgia to race at Atlanta Motor Speedway. I hope they get a good crowd there, but I’m worrying a little. The race that used to run in March had trouble drawing. This weekend’s race is two weeks earlier than the old one was. Here’s your listings for the week.
Tuesday, February 24
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 11 a.m. - 2 p.m. | AMA Monster Energy Supercross: Atlanta | FOX Sports 1*# (from February 21) |
| 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | NASCAR America | NBC Sports Network |
| 6 p.m. - 7 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1 |
| 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 2*# |
Wednesday, February 25
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 6 a.m. - 8 a.m. | Camping World Truck Series NextEra Energy Resources 250 | FOX Sports 2*/# (from February 20) |
| 8 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. | XFINITY Series Alert Today Florida 300 | FOX Sports 2*/# (from February 21) |
| 10:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series Daytona 500 | FOX Sports 2*/# (from February 22) |
| 1:30 p.m. - 2 p.m. | NASCAR Victory Lane | FOX Sports 2*# |
| 4:30 p.m. - 5 p.m. | NASCAR America's The List: Memorable Moments | NBC Sports Network# |
| 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | NASCAR America | NBC Sports Network |
| 6 p.m. - 7 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1 |
| 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 2*# |
| 8 p.m. - 9 p.m. | AMSOil Arenacross: Grand Rapids | FOX Sports 2*# |
Thursday, February 26
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | NASCAR America | NBC Sports Network |
| 6 p.m. - 7 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1 |
| 6:30 p.m. - 7 p.m. | NASCAR America's The List: Dale Earnhardt, Sr. Moments | NBC Sports Network# |
| 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 2*# |
| 11:30 p.m. - 12:30 a.m. | NASCAR Gridiron Challenge | NBC Sports Network# |
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 12:30 a.m. - 1 a.m. | NASCAR America's The List: Greatest Finishes | NBC Sports Network# |
| 1:30 a.m. - 2 a.m. | NASCAR America: Celebrate the States, Part No. 1 | NBC Sports Network# |
| 2 a.m. - 2:30 a.m. | NASCAR America: Celebrate the States, Part No. 2 | NBC Sports Network# |
| 2:30 a.m. - 3 a.m. | NASCAR America: Celebrate the States, Part No. 3 | NBC Sports Network# |
| 10 a.m. - 11 a.m. | XFINITY Series Practice No. 1 | FOX Sports 1 |
| 11 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1 |
| 11:30 a.m. - 1 p.m. | XFINITY Series Happy Hour | FOX Sports 1 |
| 1 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series Practice No. 1 | FOX Sports 1 |
| 2:30 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | Camping World Truck Series Practice | FOX Sports 1 |
| 3:30 p.m. - 4 p.m. | Formula Drift: Showdown, Part No. 1 | NBC Sports Network*/# (from September 12) |
| 5:30 p.m. - 7 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series Qualifying | FOX Sports 1 |
| 7 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. | NASCAR America | NBC Sports Network |
Saturday, February 28
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 3:30 a.m. - 5 a.m. | Sprint Cup Series Qualifying | FOX Sports 1*# (from February 27) |
| 5 a.m. - 6 a.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1# |
| 9 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. | XFINITY Series Qualifying | FOX Sports 1 |
| 10:30 a.m. - 12 p.m. | Camping World Truck Series Qualifying | FOX Sports 1 |
| 12 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series Happy Hour | FOX Sports 1 |
| 1:30 p.m. - 2 p.m. | NASCAR RaceDay: XFINITY Edition | FOX Sports 1 |
| 2 p.m. - 5 p.m. | XFINITY Series Hisense 250 | FOX Sports 1 |
| 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | NCWTS Setup | FOX Sports 1 |
| 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. | Camping World Truck Series Hyundai Construction Equipment 200 | FOX Sports 1 |
| 7 p.m. - 10 p.m. | AMA Monster Energy Supercross: Atlanta | FOX Sports 2*# (from February 21) |
| 10 p.m. - 12 a.m. | Camping World Truck Series Hyundai Construction Equipment 200 | FOX Sports 2*# |
Sunday, March 1
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 12 a.m. - 2:30 a.m. | XFINITY Series Hisense 250 | FOX Sports 2*/# (from February 28) |
| 3 a.m. - 6 a.m. | AMA Monster Energy Supercross: Atlanta | FOX Sports 1*# (from February 21) |
| 11 a.m. - 12 p.m. | NASCAR RaceDay | FOX Sports 1 |
| 12:30 p.m. - 1 p.m. | FOX NASCAR Sunday | FOX |
| 1 p.m. - 2 p.m. | AMSOil Arenacross: Grand Rapids | FOX Sports 1# |
| 1 p.m. - 5 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series QuikTrip Folds of Honor 500 | FOX |
| 6 p.m. - 6:30 p.m. | NASCAR Victory Lane | FOX Sports 1* |
| 8 p.m. - 9 p.m. | AMSOil Arenacross: Nashville | FOX Sports 2* |
| 10 p.m. - 1 a.m. | AMA Monster Energy Supercross: Atlanta | FOX Sports 2*# (from February 21) |
Monday, March 2
| Time | Telecast | Network |
|---|---|---|
| 2:30 a.m. - 5:30 a.m. | Sprint Cup Series QuikTrip Folds of Honor 500 | FOX Sports 1*/# (from March 1) |
| 5:30 a.m. - 6 a.m. | NASCAR Victory Lane | FOX Sports 1*# |
| 10 a.m. - 1 p.m. | Sprint Cup Series QuikTrip Folds of Honor 500 | FOX Sports 1*/# (from March 1) |
| 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. | NASCAR America | NBC Sports Network |
| 6 p.m. - 7 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 1 |
| 7 p.m. - 8 p.m. | NASCAR Gridiron Challenge | NBC Sports Network# |
| 8 p.m. - 9 p.m. | NASCAR RaceHub | FOX Sports 2*# |
| 10 p.m. - 11:31 p.m. | I Am Dale Earnhardt | SPIKE |
* – Tape Delayed
/ – Highlighted Coverage
# – Repeat Coverage
I will provide critiques of the Sprint Cup, XFINITY and Camping World Truck Series races for next week’s edition of Couch Potato Tuesday here at Frontstretch. For this week’s edition of the Critic’s Annex in the Frontstretch Newsletter, I’ll be covering the K&N Pro Series East opener from New Smyrna Speedway.
If you have a gripe with me, or just want to say something about my critique, feel free to post in the comments below, or contact me through the email address provided on the website in my bio. Also, if you want to “like” me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter, please click on the appropriate icons below. Finally, if you would like to contact FOX Sports personally with an issue regarding their TV coverage, please click on the following links:
“FOX Sports”:http://msn.foxsports.com/feedback
At this point, there is still no public contact e-mail for NBC Sports. When they finally get around to creating a new link, I will post it for you.
As always, if you choose to contact the network by email, do so in a courteous manner. Network representatives are far more likely to respond to emails that ask questions politely rather than emails full of rants and vitriol.
About the author
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.
A daily email update (Monday through Friday) providing racing news, commentary, features, and information from Frontstretch.com
We hate spam. Your email address will not be sold or shared with anyone else.
You wonder whether Petree has this sort of nothing role right now, but maybe in store for a bigger role next season. Fox has relegated one former crew chief to the B team already. They have one other former crew chief in the booth. It’s pretty clear to me something should be done, next year to freshen the booth after 15 years. DW is getting tougher and tougher to stomach and it seems Larry McReynolds’ only value is figuring out how many pit stops a team needs with 100 laps to go or when the last caution at the last race at a given track was. Most of us that have watched more than a few races or have Internet access can figure that out ourselves.
I skipped the Fox coverage where they were promoting Mikey & DW rather than the race. I’ve skipped the pre-race coverage (whether it is that mess that Raceday has become) or the Fox nonsense for the past 4 years. Seldom if ever do they have something on I’d be interested in. That said, I’m sorry that I didn’t see the piece with the drivers talking about Gordon. I’d probably have enjoyed that, but not enough to put with the Fox silliness – I’ll look for it on youtube.
I use the TV broadcast for pictures and mute the sound. I always liked Mike Joy doing PXP but since DW continually talks over him, it isn’t worth it to me to have the sound on the majority of the time. I use raceview & the scanner feature of that product to follow the race (even though raceview has problems of its own). I did try out racebuddy and that worked very well last week. Larry Mac? Huh, he’s become worthless on the broadcast since he had the temerity to speak the truth about NASCAR and they removed his guts along with his hard card.
I agree that Fox missed what was going on when there was that slide in the pack. I saw it on tv and heard the spotters telling the drivers to watch out. I was amazed that didn’t result in the “big one”.
I have no problem with a race ending under yellow. I’ve never liked the GWC and at RP tracks that is an even worse scenario. I knew there were too few laps left for it to change much except at the front or to result in a wreck and it did.
15 years is long enough for the current crew and next year they should change it up. The broadcast team as it stands is stuck in the mud and not interesting to watch. The difference between what Fox does with the NFL broadcasts and that team versus what is done for NASCAR is night and day. I tune in for the NFL pre-game and post-game wrap ups because there is actual information & opinions offered, not the silliness that goes on in the NASCAR broadcast booth.
First, as a Canadian, when I read about the new FOX channel on Jayski on Saturday, my excitement quickly turned to disappointment. The channel is only available on Rogers cable, and is not available to anyone on Bell Canada’s Fibe system. And it won’t be available to Bell customers any time soon. It has something to do with a power play by Rogers, who has lost a lot of customers to Bell.
Second, throughout the weekend, where the heck was The Brainless Wonder? No live appearances, no live comments about the Kurt Busch controversy, no live comments about the Kyle Busch situation, no nothing! This idiot purely does not care about the sport, so, why doesn’t this incompetent moron step down and turn the control over to someone who will be there all the time? You know, like his Grandfather and Father did when they controlled NASCAR? What a pathetic excuse for so-called leadership!
Emperor Brian spent Sunday trying to figure out a way to get someone else to pay for the Safer barriers at Daytona. Trying to get him to spend money is like trying to get Scrooge to pay for another slice of bread.
Ha, you are so right on $ issue, Brainless much prefers to spend other people’s money. I’m sure he was somewhere more “important” than Daytona. Unlike his grandfather & father, Brainless considers stock car racing beneath him.
Fox must really hate us, the poor misinformed viewers!
The FS1 pre-race show featured “Screamin’ Kenny” Wallace and “The Butcher of Grammarville” Larry Mac (although, I did appreciate his call out of the track owners). I tuned in to get an update on Schrub, turned off when the poll question of the day was “Should the #24 number be retired?” – to which Kenny, in his best “you clods don’t know nuthin’ style” replied “NO, AND I’LL TELL YOU WHY…”
Then the race itself, or should I say “The Great American Commercial Fest.” Look, I know it’s expensive to do TV these days, but come on! For relief, I tuned in to my local radio station running MRN, but the commercial load there was just as bad.
Fox insists on using that crappy tracker thingy that is as useless as the Waltrip twins. For some reason, I don’t mind Mickey doing the truck races; but everywhere else he’s just so full of himself its painful. DW is clearly not paying attention half the time. (As a side note, during the Bathurst 12 race, their pit reporter Bretts gave a pretty good description of the fabulous Mt Panorama track whilst under full speed, whereas DW wet his panties on his ride!).
I’m really hoping that Steve Byrnes gets better real soon so that “Double A” get be relieved of one of his way too many duties. Really dislike his whole demeanor on Race Hub and he can not call a race.
Well, this rant has been building for a few seasons now, and I’m glad to finally let it out!
Yes, I do enjoy watching all forms of racing, from F1 to snowmobiles (those guys are nuts) – just wish I could enjoy NASCAR on Fox, but can’t. Waiting until NBC takes over (and their daily talk fest is so much better than Race Hub).
Oh boy, you hit the nail on the head for the reasons why I don’t watch the pre-race show with Kenny the Klown. that BS, “listen up, race fans” line ticked me off one too many times and I just quit watching.
Agree with you as well on Adam Alexander. I really hope Steve gets well soon, not only for his sake but for ours!
Want to give a shout out to Kevin Harvick – great job in the booth! Also would like to see much more of Andy Petree who would be much more interesting than Larry Mac in the booth. Would also like to see both Mike Joy and DW take the retirement trail !!
I too was pleasantly surprised with Harvick’s demeanor in the booth. Too bad he’s such a bonehead when things don’t go his way on the track.
Did anyone else notice the irony of Kevin Harvick in the booth talking about how much he wanted an underdog to win when he’s one of the cup guys that usually runs several Xfinity races a year?
LOL, yes.
I live in Canada but watch TV via satelite and so have the American channels to watch. I watch very little of SPEED CANADA because even if they have some current auto programming they have this irritating habit of running these idiotic adds for their old rerun series at every commercial break. In a race you will see the same half dozen obnoxious addds eight to ten times. Speed is the only channel where I will switch channels just to watch someone elses commercials. Now to get around alll the commercials on any race I record them all and start watching them an hour later.
I love your commentary Phil you do a great job but whether you like it or not we’re NEVER gonna get rid of the Waltrips