This weekend should have a good amount of action to whet the appetites of race fans. Sports car fans have the IMSA season finales at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta. Meanwhile, NASCAR ventures into some new territory.
Where to Watch NASCAR This Week
This weekend, NASCAR has a home game at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Teams and drivers will likely have a lot of friends and family in attendance since (for the vast majority of them), it is the closest track on the schedule to their homes.
Even though this will be the seventh time that NASCAR has competed on Charlotte Motor Speedway’s ROVAL, things are quite different.
This weekend, teams will be competing on a revised circuit. Previously, turns 5 and 6 in the infield were a double apex pair of right turns that went uphill. Now, the old turn 6 has been eliminated. Instead, drivers will plunge down the hill to a new turn 6, then go through a hairpin left to re-enter the quad-oval. The final chicane has also been modified.
When the ROVAL was first announced for 2018, the circuit that was revealed was 2.44 miles in length and actually incorporated the section of the new configuration from the new turn 6 and through the hairpin. This configuration was eventually declined.
Since there is a new layout in play, NASCAR has expanded the amount of practice for the weekend. NASCAR Cup Series teams will get two 20-minute practice sessions each in their groups, while NASCAR Xfinity Series teams will get one 50-minute practice session.
For the NASCAR Cup Series, the practice sessions are scheduled to begin at 12:30 p.m. ET Saturday with live coverage on USA Network. Qualifying will follow shortly afterwards.
Coverage of the Bank of America ROVAL 400k will begin with Countdown to Green at 2 p.m. ET Sunday on NBC. Race coverage will start at 2:30 p.m. ET with the green flag at 2:45 p.m. ET.
Weather-wise, Sunday looks pretty good. The forecast is for sunny skies with a high of 81° with no chance of rain.
For the Xfinity Series, they are scheduled to practice at 10 a.m. ET Saturday morning with live coverage on USA Network. Qualifying will follow shortly afterwards.
Coverage of the Drive for the Cure 250k with NASCAR Countdown Live at 3:30 p.m. ET on The CW. Race coverage is scheduled to start at 4 p.m. ET with the green flag at 4:10 p.m. ET.
Note that the race will air as the second part of a CW Sports doubleheader after the conclusion of Georgia Tech vs. North Carolina. Do not be surprised if the football game runs long and runs into pre-race, or even the race itself.
Weather for Saturday afternoon in Concord, N.C. is similar to Sunday. Partly cloudy skies with a high of 78°. Great weather to watch a race.
TV Ratings Check — Talladega
Sunday’s YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway earned a 1.74 rating with 3.127 million viewers on NBC. The rating is up 23% from last year’s 1.4 rating and up 25% from last year’s 2.505 million viewers. Good all around.
Saturday’s United Rentals 250 for the Xfinity Series had 917,000 viewers. That is the biggest Xfinity audience on The CW to this point.
Now, there is no direct comparison to last year since this race didn’t exist last year. The most recent fall Xfinity race at Talladega earned a .60 rating with 1.019 million viewers on USA Network in 2022.
Last year, Charlotte was on Talladega’s weekend. That race earned a .7 rating with 1.121 million viewers on NBC.
The Love’s RV Stop 225 for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series had 343,000 viewers Friday afternoon. This is down over 46% over last year’s race, which earned a .36 rating with 626,000 viewers.
The obvious reasoning here is that last year’s race was on a Saturday afternoon with no Xfinity race on the schedule. The race started prior to 4 p.m. local time on Friday, which meant that a lot of potential viewers couldn’t watch because they were at work.
Personally, I couldn’t watch the first 30 laps live because the race started before the end of my workday. Then, I had to drive back home, keeping tabs of the race on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. I have seen the whole race broadcast since then thanks to my trusty DVR.
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.
CW coverage is spotty at best. Local stations only run the races…if you’re lucky enough to have a local affiliate in your area. If not, they say they will show the replay on the actual CW on Sunday. but not necessarily. The Xfinity race from Dega was live ONLY. No replay. Not a lot of importance placed on their race ‘coverage’, or for the fans. They must have paid NASCAR a ton of $ to offer such miserable tc time.