Sunday/Monday TV Updates

TDP will live blog the Sprint Cup Series race from Auto Club Speedway beginning at 5PM Eastern Time and continuing through the post-race TV coverage. Please join us.

NASCAR Performance, Smarts and In A Hurry: (2:00 to 3:30PM - SPEED) Larry McReynolds and Chad Knaus talk racing in California from a crew chief perspective. Kyle Petty and Rutledge Wood play a game show with fans. Adam Alexander shows the video clips from Friday and Saturday.

RaceDay: (3:30PM - SPEED) Live guests include Kurt Busch, Elliott Sadler and Brian Vickers. Features include a review of Roush-Fenway Racing’s dominance of Auto Club Speedway and a review of how NASCAR’s new testing policies have impacted teams. Wendy Venturini's Real Deal features a ride-along with Matt Kenseth as he goes on a whirlwind tour of New York City after winning the Daytona 500.

Sprint Cup Series: (5:00PM - Fox) Darrell Waltrip interviews Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the pre-race show which overlaps with RaceDay on SPEED. Chris Myers and Jeff Hammond join Waltrip on the pre-race. Mike Joy, Larry McReynolds and Waltrip call the race which starts at 6PM.

The SPEED Report: (7PM - SPEED) Studio hosts this week are Bob Varsha and Ralph Sheheen. Bob Dillner is the Nationwide and Sprint Cup Series field reporter while Adam Alexander will handle the Camping World Trucks.

For the 2AM Eastern, 11PM Pacific airing, The SPEED Report will have full race Sprint Cup Series highlights, post race reaction and late breaking news from Sunday’s race.

Wind Tunnel: (9PM - SPEED) SPEED Formula 1 reporter, Peter Windsor, will co-host. In addition to preparing for SPEED’s coverage of the 2009 season, Windsor is also preparing to become a F1 team owner in 2010. NASCAR highlights from California.

Victory Lane: (10PM - SPEED) John Roberts, Jimmy Spencer and Kenny Wallace host the winning driver, crew chief and owner. Bob Dillner reports from pit road.

Monday's NASCAR Now: (5PM - ESPN2) Allen Bestwick will host with Ricky Craven, Randy LaJoie and Mike Wallace as his "expert panel."

Monday's TWIN: (8PM - SPEED) Michael Waltrip and special guest Aric Almirola join Steve Byrnes to recap the California Sprint Cup race, the Nationwide event and the Camping World Truck Series race from Saturday afternoon. Scanner chatter will be a feature as well as a preview of the Las Vegas Sprint Cup race including a look back at some of the hardest wrecks at the 1 ½ mile track. The trio will also answer viewer email.

There is no Sunday night edition of NASCAR Now until ESPN begins televising the Sprint Cup Series races in July. However, ESPNEWS will have Mike Wallace and provide a post-race wrap-up with live coverage of the winner's news conference after the race.

That's a preview of the upcoming shows, please feel free to add your TV-related comments. This is a family-friendly website, so foul language or hateful speech will cause your comment to be deleted.

Thanks again and happy posting.

NOTE: The Nationwide Series coverage started on ESPN Classic Network due to the over-run of live college basketball but has now returned to ESPN2.

Here is the scoop from ESPN on tonight's Nationwide Series race:

The Nationwide Series continues this weekend with a 300-mile event at the 2-mile Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. Live coverage presented by GoDaddy.com airs Saturday, Feb. 21, beginning at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN2 and ESPN2 HD with NASCAR Countdown.

Dr. Jerry Punch will be the lap-by-lap announcer, joined by 1999 NASCAR Sprint Cup champion Dale Jarrett and two-time Cup Series champion crew chief Andy Petree. Dave Burns, Jamie Little, Shannon Spake and Vince Welch will report from the pits, while two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion crew chief Tim Brewer will be in the ESPN Craftsman Tech Garage.

Allen Bestwick will host NASCAR Countdown with analysis by 1989 NASCAR Cup Series champion Rusty Wallace and Brad Daugherty, a winning team owner in the NASCAR Nationwide Series, in the ESPN pit studio.The crowd was sparse for the afternoon Camping World Truck Series race, so it should be interesting to see the attendance for the Nationwide event.

This post will host your TV-related comments about the Nationwide Series race from California on ESPN2. This is a family-oriented website, foul language or hateful speech will cause your comment to be deleted.

Thanks again and happy posting.

DW Tries To Put Daytona In The Rearview Mirror

Trackside is a show on SPEED that normally hosts some good conversation with drivers and team owners. Two guests appear in each hour show and the panel of Darrell Waltrip, Jeff Hammond and Larry McReynolds talks about a wide variety of topics. Steve Byrnes is the host.

Friday night from California, Darrell Waltrip tried to explain once and for all the decision by NASCAR to end the Daytona 500 shortly after 7PM on a Sunday evening.

Here are his well-chosen words:

Most of us are self-serving. We would prefer to have it this way or we would prefer to have it that way. We want everything kind of the way we want it.

NASCAR, in their defense, and people get on us all the time for taking up for them...but you have got to understand something. They don't just look at what is good for Steve Byrnes, for Larry McReynolds or Jeff Hammond or SPEED Channel or Fox.

They look at what's good for everybody. In these economic times, keeping those teams there another night in hotels to come back the next day and run 38 laps...I know it's the Super Bowl and I know that we would all have liked to see it finish...but it did not make sense to put everybody through that.

And besides that, even if the forecast for Monday was good...what if it wasn't good?

Waltrip also mentioned the fact that he was a guest on the WindTunnel show on SPEED and as he left the studio in Daytona and returned to him motorhome slightly after 10PM, it was still raining.

So, thank you for all the email about whether or not Fox interfered or suggested or pushed for the end of the Daytona 500 so the network could get off the air in time for the primetime entertainment line-up.

What Waltrip is saying and we are agreeing with is that the TV networks did not play a role in the decision to end the race. A bad weather forecast, a long travel week to California and even a common sense decision about team expenses combined to motivate NASCAR to act quickly, declare the race over and move-on to California.

Please feel free to add your comments on this topic. Just click the comments button below. This is a family-friendly site and foul language or hateful speech will result in a comment being deleted.

Thanks again and happy posting.

Note: The Camping World Truck Series race is on Fox at 3PM, not SPEED. There are a select number of Truck Series races that appear on Fox each season as a part of the NASCAR TV contract.

The NASCAR on Fox broadcast team handles the coverage of these races. In the past, this coverage also included Digger coming over for a visit with the CWTS.

Note: Mike Wallace will co-host the Sunday morning edition of NASCAR Now on ESPN2. Wallace will then join ESPNEWS after the race for analysis and finally guest on the Monday roundtable panel of the one hour NASCAR Now program hosted by Allen Bestwick.