Circuit of the Americas brought a wild card to the table for NASCAR teams. The decision was made to move the races from the 3.427-mile Grand Prix course to a shorter 2.4-mile configuration created for the weekend (the original short course, used by the Repco Supercars Championship in 2013, was deemed to be unsuitable).
It also coincided with the debut of FOX Sports’ coverage of the NTT IndyCar Series. Admittedly, that coverage was more comprehensive than what NASCAR is getting from their longtime TV partner, although not all of that is FOX Sports’ fault.
Personnel-wise, Jamie Little will be splitting time between NASCAR and IndyCar coverage this year. She was in St. Petersburg over the weekend, which resulted in Kaitlyn Vincie working her first NASCAR Cup Series race as a pit reporter. To be fair, she did just fine Sunday (Mar. 2).
The NASCAR broadcast Sunday started immediately after coverage from St. Petersburg wrapped up (due to the broadcast running a little long, NASCAR RaceDay started late). There was a fairly substantial contrast between the two productions. I think FOX Sports may have brought in some of the people from NBC Sports for its IndyCar coverage, but I’m not sure.
Watching Sunday’s race, one of the first things that you noticed was the wind. Circuit of the Americas has huge flags, and they were standing straight out during the race. That can be problematic.
It seemed to only get worse as the race continued. Normally, you’d notice that because the shots suddenly move around a bunch due to buffering. That happens with gusty winds. This was just sustained wind.
As the race continued, you likely noticed that some of the shots that viewers had access to were limited. In-car camera footage, often from bumper cams, was used to substitute for regular shots. From what I can tell, it appears that a number of the camerapeople at the track were hoisted up on scissor lifts. That is not the place to be on a windy day.
Unfortunately, the design of Circuit of the Americas means that if you lose the advantage of elevation, it’s going to be hard to show all the action. Unfortunately, it can lead to instances like this:
Pass for the lead? Here's a grandstand pic.twitter.com/3okgwRrSbb
— BrakeHard (@BrakeHardBlog) March 2, 2025
It stinks, but a lot of that was out of FOX Sports’ control. It’s a NASCAR race. FOX doesn’t want to get people killed trying to broadcast a race.
The high winds Sunday likely also made it harder to cover additional stories. For example, what happened to AJ Allmendinger in the closing laps? He was running fourth with 12 laps to go, right in the mix. He finished 30th. I have no idea what happened to him.
The start of the race will likely be best remembered for Chase Elliott getting spun out by Ross Chastain, who apparently tried to go for the win from ninth on the grid. However, they weren’t the only ones negatively affected.
Not a good start for driver No. 9. pic.twitter.com/HkdePYFIfE
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) March 2, 2025
Connor Zilisch, who made his Cup debut Sunday, cut his right front tire on the first lap as a result of contact. In addition, Denny Hamlin had the right front fender ripped off of his No. 11 Toyota.
Were there replays of all of this? Yes, there were. Unfortunately, FOX has fallen in love with this high aerial shot from a helicopter for turn 1. While it showed the move that led to Elliott’s spin pretty well, it was so far up there that you couldn’t make out the other issues. As for Hamlin, Ty Gibbs rode up his fender, similar to what he did at Bowman Gray Stadium, ripping it off.
Viewers didn’t get replays from another angle until lap 40. It was only at that point that you could fully tell what happened to everyone. I don’t want things like that to take that long to show.
During the race, track limits were a big discussion. That’s not a surprise to me since Circuit of the Americas is the worst track in the world for track limits. When IMSA raced there, they red-flagged a practice session in 2017 so that the race director could chide everyone about the limits.
NASCAR only officiates the limits in the Esses, but there was confusion about what to do in turn 6. Early in the race, Clint Bowyer noted that Shane van Gisbergen was cruising for a bruising with the lines he was taking there, particularly in turn 6. Van Gisbergen was not penalized for the lines that he took, although a few other drivers were given penalties during the race (Alex Bowman, who finished ninth, got two).
Eventually, this led to a mid-race rule clarification from NASCAR that it wasn’t officiating the limits in that turn while still doing so in the rest of the Esses. That led to drivers legally going inside the green that was inside of the curbs before the race ended. It’s all rather ridiculous. Makes me wish that wasn’t all paved, but no, we can’t have that.
Entering the weekend, one of the biggest stories this year has been cautions on the final lap of races and whether or not NASCAR should push the button. To that end, FOX Sports asked a couple of drivers (Christopher Bell, Kyle Larson and Joey Logano) about the recent spate of last-lap cautions and what they thought about how NASCAR has been handling it. What we got is basically that they understand the gripes of the fans, but at the same time, they don’t want drivers (or anyone else) to get hurt.
Zilisch’s debut was a big story on Sunday, although fans who only watch Cup might not know much about him. So, FOX ran an introduction piece on him, which was something else. He admitted to running into a mailbox while trying to catch a frisbee about a decade ago and soiling himself from the shock of it. Embarrassing? You betcha. I don’t think I’d want to admit that on network television, though.
Post-race coverage was brief since the race ended after the sign-off time of 7 p.m. ET. Viewers only got post-race interviews with Bell and William Byron before leaving Austin for the show Extracted.
Overall, there was good racing to be had on Sunday, likely much better than I expected going in. FOX did a good job covering the actual racing at the very front of the field. Once things spread out a bit, the broadcast wasn’t so good.
The broadcasters were deficient in showing how teams were moving through the field for much of the day except for Zilisch, who had to come from the rear after his cut tire on the first lap. Zilisch finished last after crashing out with teammate Daniel Suarez on lap 50.
The weather, while nice on the surface, wreaked havoc with FOX’s presentation. FOX understandably had to be safe out there but lost so much in the process.
The updates were not quite up to par, although they were better than what we got at Atlanta Motor Speedway. We still didn’t get much of an idea of tire wear Sunday, even though it was said to be quite substantial. That is something we got during the NASCAR Xfinity Series race on The CW.
There were a couple of things that were cleaned up like the mess that we had over the first two weeks with crew introductions. That was replaced with issues like the map of the track being positioned too high so you couldn’t see the north end of the course.
That’s all for this week. Next week, NASCAR travels to Arizona for its first visit of 2025 to Phoenix Raceway. The NASCAR Cup Series will be joined there by the NASCAR Xfinity Series and ARCA Menards Series. The ARCA race is a combination race with the ARCA Menards Series West. TV listings can be found here.
We will look at next weekend’s Shriners Children’s 500k in next week’s edition of Couch Potato Tuesday here at Frontstretch. The Critic’s Annex will cover Saturday’s Focused Health 250k for the Xfinity Series.
Don’t think that FOX’s NTT IndyCar Series debut will go unnoticed. I plan to have something on that later this week.
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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.