Thursday, January 12, 2012

Thursday - NASCAR TV Live Blog Daytona Testing


The off-season is over and NASCAR is back on TV and the Internet from Daytona as testing gets underway for the Sprint Cup Series teams.

Three days of testing have the same format. The 9AM to noon session will be streamed online at SPEED.com and the afternoon 1PM session will be on SPEED TV.

John Roberts hosts the testing coverage. Rick Allen and Jeff Hammond have the AM session with Wendy Venturini and Bob Dillner reporting. Steve Byrnes has Larry McReynolds and Darrell Waltrip in the TV booth for the afternoon session. Randy Pemberton and Hermie Sadler are the reporters.

The idea of covering this by SPEED is to accomplish several things. First, to point out the new driver, team and crew chief combinations. Secondly, to update fans on news from the off-season by speaking to the personalities involved. Finally, to explore the new rule changes for Daytona by watching the action on the track and in the garage.

It is very clear from the radiator and cooling changes that NASCAR is still trying to break-up the "tandem racing" that fans saw at Daytona and other restrictor plate tracks last season. This will be a key element of the coverage.

This post will serve to host your TV and media related comments as the coverage rolls along. Please feel free to add an opinion, ask a question or give a review of just how you feel the Daytona activity is being translated online or on TV by SPEED.

Thanks again for taking the time to stop by The Daly Planet, now in our sixth year of providing daily NASCAR TV and media coverage.

75 comments:

larry said...

I'll be driving up to Daytona today, so I will tape the speed coverage and see what I missed.

Vicky D said...

I've got a burst of anticipation for Nascar this year. Let's see what will be happening at testing today although I have to wait until I get home to watch the recorded show.

AncientRacer said...

Good Morning all.

A new season and a blog is reason enough for me to come into my office today! :)

I don't see Jr. on the list of cars bob Pockrass put out over twitter. Does anyone know why?

AncientRacer said...

Sorry. Jr. is on the list. I was looking for the "8". Senior moment

w17scott said...

Is it me, or is it SPEED? Not able to get on speedtv.com ...interesting that verif word is pride

Chadderbox said...

Thanks for the great information this off season.

I am having problem getting on the speed website??

My Firefox Browser just did an update this morning and I am not sure if that is the issue or not. I am not having problems with other websites though.

Anonymous said...

Getting database errors here trying to reconnect - though the stream was working til I had to kill Firefox...

Vicky D said...

W17 I was not able to access speedtv.com just now either. And word verification is nocke. Who's there?

Chadderbox said...

I am getting the same problem on IE8.

Anonymous said...

site/vid is up

Chadderbox said...

I am on now using Firefox.

w17scott said...

@Anon 935a ...thanks for the heads-up ...on site now

rich said...

streaming on the big screen TV is NICE
and I could get used to this no commercial thing
no problems with feed at all

Jimm57 said...

Love hearing the engines roaring again!

Anonymous said...

Welcome, Scott. Laptop's a 17" widescreen...it's pretty nice watching it expanded to full-size.

Coverage is pretty solid too.

Vicky D said...

Even tho my company sponsors one of the cars, I'm not able to watch the streaming so will have to get updates from twitter.

Lou said...

Hi JD,

Enjoying the show online. NASCAR take note. just wired up the tv to the computer. LOVE IT.

even if i did not watch on the tv, I still can enjoy it on the cpu.

and yes JD, still have a VCR! lol, but moving up , have a dvd player

Anonymous said...

Love this online. I hope speed does more of it. Finally hearing information about all the changes in the off season.

TexasRaceLady said...

How nice to hear the engines and see cars on track.

Veri word is scrabl ---- ROTFL

Anonymous said...

How do you have a belt come off the first run? I believe there is a questionable person on that team. Something off or loose all the time.

Anonymous said...

Did Denny Hamlin say he moved to Arizona full time?

Buschseries61 said...

I took a look online, very nice job by SPEED. Perfect opportunity to bring Twitter into the broadcast. And Hermie & Wendy are incredible on pit road. There's not that many stories 1 hour in, but they are digging and already found a lot!

RvNGrammy said...

Cannot get SPEED to work...internet too slow at this hotel! So...who had a belt come off?

Anonymous said...

Rvngrammy.........Jr.

Steve L. said...

My home connection is so slow it's just un-watchable. Going to have to really look into high speed Internet connection. :(

Jimm57 said...

Good job by Speed, good show. Lovin' it!

Daly Planet Editor said...

Pretty good show this AM. Lots going in!

Daly Planet Editor said...

Or...lots going on...I hate cell phone typing!

Buschseries61 said...

We just got a mini-tour of the broadcast booth. Jeff Hammond was not given the Phil Parsons height box and Rick had to squat down! lol

Buschseries61 said...

And here's the height crate...lol

Anonymous said...

commercial free NASCAR is nice.

Daly Planet Editor said...

Tell me this is not the wave of the future!

Bobb57 said...

that was a good tweet question about Stewart giving Danica points being he has provisional

RvNGrammy said...

(Expletive deleted). !!!! Hate to see anyone lose his job, but the person responsible for that needs to be reassigned to a job where he doesn't touch the car...or fired!

Palmetto said...

Must just be me that's having problems. All I get is "ERROR Timed-out trying to establish a connection to server". Firefox and IE both.

Daly Planet Editor said...

Great job of including fans today.

tominmn said...

Finally got the SPEEDTV stream to work. Had to update FLASH. There goes my works bandwidth.

Palmetto said...

tominmn, what version of Flash? I'm running 11.

AncientRacer said...

So are you there JD? Izzat why you are using the phone?

tominmn said...

Palmetto, I had to update to 11.

AncientRacer said...

Looking at Jimmie's hood coming in there is more sheet metal definition to it than last year.

Still, they look so the same...

Zetona said...

When will we see multiple cars on the track? That's what I really want to see.

Zetona said...

AR, if the Chevy hoods are indeed different, the difference is very slight indeed. Do you think it'll do anything for handling in traffic?

Anonymous said...

When is drafting practice?

AncientRacer said...

@Zetona

Maybe. Hendrick luvs them wind tunnels. But how are we to know yet since everyone is, like you noted, running solo? :)

..and from what Smoke just said, sounds like they will be running alone all today. NASCAR must be looking at single car baseline speeds with the new injector / plate system.

Zetona said...

Another thing. Aren't manufacturers supposed to revise the body styles of their cars every three years? Well, I don't think Chevy has done so yet with the COT, at least not noticeably. Might that be because we'll see all-new bodies next year?

Zetona said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Chadderbox said...

I am at work with access to a laptop.

Will the 1pm session be available online?

AncientRacer said...

@Zetona

I would guess that is the reason. The "Car of Tomorrow, Tomorrow" (Thank you, Stephen Colbert)

And Marty just said Nascar will allow drafting this afternoon. Good!

Spencer said...

I'm already getting tired of Danica today.

Daly Planet Editor said...

Told no drafting until tomorrow. New car changes kick in next year. Pretty good day so fsr.

Chadderbox said...

Just saw twitter -Speed said 1pm will ONLY be on TV.

My DVR is on at home and I will watch later and just follow on twitter this afternoon.

Anonymous said...

West Coast Diane said:

Thank you SPEED. As name implies, your online streaming allows my husband and me to watch/listen while having coffee in bed.

Great to hear/see the cars on track.

More please :-)

Dot said...

Thank you SPEED for showing testing. I've missed seeing cars on the track. Forty four days until the D500.

AncientRacer said...

Can somebody 'splain why the drivers cannot talk to each other?

My only real guess is that so they will be flying blind and that discourages love-bugging.

Just doesn't seem real smert from a saftey perspective

Anonymous said...

Hope Daytona offers a heck of a good purse - as squirrely as these cars seem to be with the tandem drafting without traffic/position changes/tire fade...think a few people will be replacing their cars come checkered flag.

Wonder why some people went to the trouble to load up and go down for testing - not seeing a lot of practicing from a few.

Anonymous said...

Ancient - I suppose if'n you gotta risk wrecking to tandem the whole race, blind, you'll see a lot less of it.

Competitively speaking, it does get rid of favoritism and maybe changes things up among who's drafting with who. I've no objections there.

I'm worried about how these things are getting all over the place so easily. Either make it impossible to do the lovebug thing, or make it safe, at least.

Daly Planet Editor said...

Enjoying the day! Wish the afternoon session was online too. Thanks for all the great comments.

Zetona said...

My guess is we'll see very little tandem drafting in the race, because the cars will overheat very quickly and require lots of switching, which would be tough to pull off in traffic. In the last few laps, though, we'll definitely see it, especially if there's a green-white-checkered finish. I hope we see a pack of more than two cars on the track today so I can test my theory.

Anonymous said...

Spluh. Went from great, fan-oriented coverage back to some overproduced, favoritism-filled dreck. IMO.

Even for Speed, this is a bit frustrating.

Anonymous said...

JD - did ESPN take over for this segment of testing or something? Went from great to commercials, promos, graphics, and stupid quasi-rock music.

I'm *trying* to be nice....heh. It's a serious question.

Bobby O said...

The 1 car with that antenna looks like an RC car!

Jonathan said...

Hey everyone!!! Happy Preseason everyone. This is fun but im looking forward to tomorrow and Saturday when we get more than these single car runs!

Nascar is back all is well again!!! :)

Vicky D said...

Just found out company's firewall is preventing me from watching streaming - guess I would use up all the bandwidth. I really haven't seen much on twitter either. Will have to wait til I get home from work to find out what has happened on the track today!

Anonymous said...

Vicky - if you can get away with it, set up a VPN outside of work, connect to it, run your internet browsing through it, et voila! Works for Chinese firewalls, Saudi firewalls, Iranian firewalls, carries an element of risk depending on how competent your IT staff is, and if a streaming video is a problem - I assure you, they should be fired.

Use Google for a how-to.

Verification for this: "panti" - seriously?

AncientRacer said...

@Anon 3:51

I have had some real gems as verification words. Some of them laugh out loud gross. It is what you get I guess with a random spelling generator

Anonymous said...

Ancient - all I can say is...life is strange. 72 year old and some other guy inexplicably had the same last names up at the hospital.

Otherwise - I can't say I'm surprised. Daly's captchas are surprisingly insightful.

This one: "troden" - I feel like that. Down variety.

Anonymous said...

sick of danica already!

Daly Planet Editor said...

Thanks everyone!

BillyDelyon said...

Overall, enjoyed the whole day, the internet stuff was way better than the TV stuff, but that being said, I enjoyed them both, I understand Speed needs to make its money during the TV time, but that streaming without is beautiful...
Hey JD, whats the story with Hermie and Speed this season? I enjoy him myself, and would not be happy to see him less...

Anonymous said...

Rather you like Danica or not she will bring new fans to NASCAR which it can use. She draws a lot of interest to the sport and Speed, Nascar, Espn are smart to play it up.

PammH said...

I sooo wish this was switched! Didn't record today just because of DW being on the late shift. And what I heard on the repeat-yep, KyBu love still intact...puke. Not working for me.

larry said...

I was at the track this afternoon and then watched TV coverage on DVR.

I thought it was interesting that the fans in the Oldfield grandstand (the free seats) were quite loud in yelling and applauding for Danica...even more than junior. Big cheer when the tandem led by junior hit the #1 on the pylon.

I heard a lot of comments about Kurt busch. Mostly "having fun yet" variety, especially when Danica passed him on the pylon.

When I left, only 7 cars had run the lovebug style. 3 Gibbs, 2 MWR and the 88/48. 24 was best of the rest when I left.

When I got home and watched the DVR, I was not impressed. Lots of good ol' boy talk in the booth. Some interesting interviews and reporting from the garage, though.

I think the skittishness of the cars was more obvious on TV.

I'll have to DVR tomorrow's action as I am scheduled to volunteer at a warbird museum all day. Maybe track/TV comparison again on Saturday.

Anonymous said...

Booth ruined it. Plain and simple. Listening to this was like watching someone with Alzheimers syndrome talk about the good old days.

And it was quite awkward.

Would someone drop a friggin' safe, or an anvil - whatever - on the stupid, company-guy running this show?

Really early - 9 am type stuff - is kickass! Afterward..it transitions to some weird universe wherein we're expected to go from 30 seconds of watching to an ad, and another 30 seconds, and an ad. No thanks

Also - as a fan you can talk to and request stuff? Speed crew - yes. They are amazing with that. ESPN? I hear praying works. They do technically own Speed and various rights to produce this stuff.

Here's my protip - watch when Speed is actually covering events. Rest is insulting - how many commercials and garbage do you think you can withstand? You will find out.

Hey, ESPN/Speed/Fuel TV and your parent company? You can do things however you want - I'll go find a book to read before SOPA kicks in.

My name Peggy. I your investment advisor. You are much of the stupid! No care for customer. Much care for stocks. No customer, no stocks. You are very being stupid.

Daly Planet Editor said...

There is a new post up for Friday testing. Just go back to the main page by clicking on the TDP logo at the top of the screen. Thanks!