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Chalk One Up for TNT and One Helluva Finish An Opinion
July 10, 2007 By Brian Watkins
Earlier in the season I lamented the coverage Fox was providing of NNCS races, specifically their feeble attempt at making their race coverage “cool” by implementing NASCAR 3D, or something to that effect providing computer animated recreations of the action on the track as opposed to simply airing a replay. It was annoying, but not as annoying as continued commercial interruptions, especially when they’d come back from commercial just in time to tell us all what we’d missed while we were away. Enter TNT. Their coverage of the Pepsi 400 was nothing short of God’s gift to race fans. Not only did they have fewer commercials, (only 17 minutes of full screen commercial interruptions) they ran a large percentage of them in the lower right corner of the screen. This is pure genius. Not only did they not interrupt the action (or even lack of action during cautions) they provided their sponsors with a venue where the commercials actually were viewed by race fans. Who gets up and uses the bathroom while the race is on? Not me. While they did kill the race audio while the commercials aired, it was hardly a distraction, and actually refreshing to be able to see almost the entire event from start to finish. I’m not sure who he marketing guru was that came up with the commercials in the corner idea, but they deserve a raise if not a promotion. I truly can’t say enough about how great this was. Next to in car cameras, this has got to be one of the greatest additions to televised racing, ever. The only sad thing about it is that it wouldn’t work for anything else really. Not many other sports would get by without any audio, and prime time television couldn’t try it, although with some of the shows these days there wouldn’t be much missed if the audio was off for the entire episode. It’s certainly nice to be able to write about something positive for a change, and keeping in that vein, I’ll add the obvious positive aspect of the race.
Between the banging and bumping and passing and attempts to pass, it was hard to even breath watching that finish. While it was clear which group of drivers the winner would come from, there was no way of knowing until the flag dropped just who was going to be driving down victory lane. It was good clean racing with no mystery cautions and while there was suspense, there was no controversy or question about who the best car was that night, even if it was a Ford.
You can contact Brian Watkins at .. Insider Racing News The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN. 
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