NBC’s NASCAR Season-Debut Flat Despite Early Morning Finish

NBC earned a 4.9/12 overnight Nielsen rating for the race segment of Saturday’s NASCAR Nextel Cup Pepsi 400, down 2% from the 5.0/10 Fox earned for its race-segment last year. The start of this year’s race was delayed until 10:30pm, and the race segment ended at 2:00am ET because of a rain delay. Weather also pushed last year’s race segment back to 9:34pm-12:26am. NBC’s entire broadcast from 7:45-2:00am ET earned a 4.2/9 (NBC).

NEITHER RAIN, NOR SNOW ...: In Daytona Beach, Godwin Kelly reported that NASCAR Chair & CEO Brian France and President Mike Helton, NBC Universal Sports & Olympics Chair Dick Ebersol, Daytona Int’l Speedway President Robin Braig and Pepsi 400 Dir David Hoots at 8:30pm “made the decision to continue” with the race despite the rain. Braig and NBC said that NASCAR “had the final call on whether to start the race or postpone it until Sunday.” NASCAR VP/Corporate Communications Jim Hunter: “Mike Helton made the decision that if we couldn’t get the track dry by 11 o’clock, that we would have to wait” (Daytona Beach NEWS-JOURNAL, 7/4). In St. Pete, John Cotey noted NBC filled the rain-delay with extra features and driver interviews. NBC Universal Sports Communications Manager Alana Russo: “When you have the pit reporters, you can just throw it down to them. It lets the viewers get a little more time with the drivers” (ST. PETERSBURG TIMES, 7/3).

Rain Delay Does Not Dampen NBC’s Pepsi 400 Ratings

RAIN DROPS: In Orlando, Mike Bianchi: “You should have seen NBC trying to fill the 2 ½ hours of dead time during the rain delay. ... They did everything but run a feature on the guy who invented the restrictor plate.” Bianchi: “It happens all too often these days. The fans who actually buy the tickets to sporting events get the shaft in this money grab for TV dollars” (ORLANDO SENTINEL, 7/5). Also in Orlando, Ed Hinton wrote NASCAR and NBC “just had to move the 400 to prime time on the Saturday night nearest the Fourth as if money were some modern miracle” (ORLANDO SENTINEL, 7/3). In Daytona Beach, Brent Woronoff: “It was another example of sports selling its soul for the all-important TV dollar” (Daytona Beach NEWS-JOURNAL, 7/3). In Tampa, Tony Fabrizio wrote while moving the Pepsi 400 from 11:00am to primetime in ‘98 “made it a bigger race,” the last two Pepsi 400s were delayed by rain. The solution: “Break with tradition and move the race into the fall” (TAMPA TRIBUNE, 7/4).

REVIEW: With NBC this season switching the duties of former booth announcer Allen Bestwick and former pit reporter Bill Weber, in Daytona, Shawn Akers wrote Bestwick “didn’t look the least bit uncomfortable in his new position as pit reporter. Weber’s first effort in the booth was solid as well” (NEWS-JOURNAL, 7/3).

SUPPORT SYSTEM: Ebersol, whose son Teddy was killed in a plane crash last November, made an unexpected visit to Saturday’s pre-race drivers meeting. Ebersol: “I wanted to tell you all from the bottom of my heart, ‘Thank you.’ This community more than any other in sports has been there for my family and for me through all of this” (CHARLOTTE OBSERVER, 7/3).