It's a back-to-back NASCAR TV doubleheader on Saturday. ABC covers the Nationwide Series race from Talladega and then SPEED hosts the Camping World Trucks at Kansas Speedway.
Allen Bestick will begin the TV activity at 2:30PM on your local ABC television station. Rusty Wallace is still on vacation, so Dale Jarrett will join Bestwick and Brad Daughery for the pre-race show.
Jarrett will then head upstairs (no easy task at Talladega) and join Dr. Jerry Punch and Andy Petree to call the race. Down on pit road will be Shannon Spake, Jamie Little, Dave Burns and Vince Welch.
This TV production team is looking to recover from a rough outing in Phoenix last week. The entire telecast focused on Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch from start-to-finish. Green flag racing on the track was actually put aside while viewers watched Edwards' damaged car being inspected in the garage area.
Punch could hardly contain his enthusiasm when Busch got a lap back in the race. Needless to say, neither Busch or Edwards won the event. ESPN had egg on its face having wasted all this time profiling the two Cup drivers. All the stories of the other teams and drivers were pushed off the table.
Talladega should offer an opportunity to get back on the right track with long laps and pack racing. Hopefully, this event will allow the ESPN production team to highlight all the drivers and include as many sponsors as possible in this struggling series.
ABC is on the air until 6PM with the Nationwide coverage. SPEED comes on at 5:30PM with the CWTS pre-race show. So, once again NASCAR fans will be asked to choose between two NASCAR TV partners due to a scheduling conflict that should have been resolved long before this weekend.
Krista Voda is in Talladega for the NASCAR on Fox coverage, so Rick Allen will host the CWTS pre-race show from Kansas. Phil Parsons will join Allen while Ray Dunlap and Adam Alexander will handle the pit road coverage.
The trucks have a very diverse field that should result in some interesting racing. The TV crew has a very basic set-up and fans should see the old-style racing coverage that emphassizes the racing and keeps things basic.
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