Here Comes Friday At Talladega On SPEED

This is the second season of the new NASCAR TV contract and it continues to be a moving target for many fans. This Friday from Talladega, the action shifts from ESPN2 back to SPEED for the full day.

The Craftsman Truck Series takes to the track at Noon Eastern Time for live qualifying action. This is a tough season for the series, with only 28 viable trucks on the Talladega entry list. There are four additional trucks that will try to qualify for the event, but they are battling with the minimum lap time and not for pole position. Driver Richard Johns in his Chevy is the slowest, almost nine full seconds off the practice speed of Todd Bodine. Nine seconds...per lap.

Rick Allen and Phil Parsons will call this session with Michael Waltrip as the third analyst in the booth. Down on pit road will be Adam Alexander and Ray Dunlap. It should be noted that Dunlap is also the media guest on Tradin' Paint this week. Fans may have some memories of his last appearance on that program which earned him a "time-out" from his employer.

Once the trucks get sorted-out, the Sprint Cup Series takes to the track for two practice sessions beginning at 2PM ET. Steve Byrnes will host with Larry McReynolds and Jeff Hammond in the broadcast booth. Down in the garage area will be Bob Dillner and Wendy Venturini.

SPEED has become a favorite for this coverage because of the network's willingness to simply cover practice. Action on the track is featured, the reporters follow-up on stories and McReynolds is wonderful at telling viewers what different teams are doing and why. Dillner and Venturini move seamlessly through the garage area as if they are team members.

In between sessions, John Roberts will host a quick version of NASCAR Live. Randy Pemberton and Hermie Sadler will give the other TV crew a break while they talk to teams about what went right and what went wrong in the early session. This same team will return after practice to host a thirty minute edition of NASCAR Live at 4:30PM. This should wrap-up the NASCAR day and prep SPEED viewers for the upcoming ARCA event.

Race coverage for the ARCA Series begins at 5PM with Allen and Parsons back on the call. Venturini will be joined by Jim Tretow to handle the reporting from pit road. Lots of NASCAR eyes will be on this race, as ARCA has quickly become one of the main training grounds for future Nationwide and Sprint Cup Series drivers.

Mike's daughter Chrissy Wallace will be in the event as will Joey Logano and his JGR teammate Marc Davis. "Mr. Red Bull" Scott Speed will be racing as will former AMA champ Ricky Carmichael in a Kevin Harvick Inc. machine.

One driver to keep an eye on is 23-year old Gabi DiCarlo who is the only full time female driver in the ARCA Series. She is pictured at the top of the page. Her sponsor is Great Clips and that company has already committed to another full ARCA schedule in 2009 with DiCarlo. She is driving the car of a teammate that won the opening ARCA event in Daytona back in February.

While the ARCA race is underway on SPEED, ESPN2 will air NASCAR Now at 5PM. Nicole Manske will host the show, recap Sprint Cup Series practice and preview the Sunday race. The Nationwide Series that normally races on ESPN2 is idle this week.

SPEED is topping-off Friday with a blockbuster of a show. In what may be the ultimate fan recipe for Talladega, it will be Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Jeff Gordon who appear as the guests on the rowdy Trackside show at 7:30PM. This show is on after the ARCA race, so viewers who are recording should add some extra time on the DVR, VCR or TiVo.

Byrnes hosts this show with Hammond and McReynolds. Elliott Sadler is the fourth panelist during this stretch of the season. Needless to say, the combination of Junior, Gordon and the Talladega crowd should be interesting to watch.

Please feel free to offer your TV-related comments on the topics above. This post will also host the in-progress comments on these SPEED programs on Friday. Let us know how you think SPEED is presenting the activities from Talladega by clicking on the COMMENTS button below.

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Shane Hmiel Returns To NASCAR...Almost

The nationally syndicated TV series Three Wide Life has been undergoing some major renovations. Just like many NASCAR teams outside of The Chase, the producers of this TV show are making changes now with an eye for 2009. One of those changes is the addition of Shane Hmiel to the line-up.

Producer Parker Williams has reached-out to Hmiel, who is currently driving Sprints, Midgets and Silver Crown cars in various series with a new outlook on life. Click here for an article by SI's Tim Tuttle on how Hmiel got his life together.

NASCAR used to have many national and regional TV series that served different purposes and aired across various areas of the country. Since the time that NASCAR consolidated its race footage and TV production, those shows have faded from the landscape.

Three Wide Life is an effort by an independent group to concentrate on interviews and conversation with NASCAR personalities. They are looking for the kind of behind-the-scenes perspective that cannot be conveyed on shows like RaceDay and NASCAR Now.

Three Wide Life has also added local Charlotte writer and reporter Brittney Cason as the new host. Originally, the current "Miss Sprint" Monica Palumbo was being considered for this role but things did not work with her current employer. Cason is a graduate of Virginia Tech and has been working on a variety of media-related projects in the Charlotte area over the past several years.

While Cason will be hosting the show, Hmiel will be featured in a very different way. As the Producer, Williams made contact with Hmiel to get his perspective on the current NASCAR scene. What he found was a clean and sober Hmiel happy to participate.

In the first new episode airing this week across the nation, Hmiel speaks-up about what he has been doing and how his new life is going. Viewers will be able to send email questions to Hmiel and he will be answering them on each episode. It should be interesting to hear Hmiel's point of view on topics ranging from Kyle Busch to The Chase. Hmiel is a person who has literally grown-up in NASCAR because of his father, Steve.

Cason will host this episode from the Richard Petty Driving Experience over at Lowe's Motor Speedway. Her feature interview is with Rick Wren, who is Ron Hornaday's crew chief in the Craftsman Truck Series. Excellent selection. There will also be a segment with Brit Goodrich from Penske Racing who talks about his pit crew role with Talladega on the horizon.

DirecTV and radio reporter Tony Rizzuti will also appear in the show with a segment called Tech Zone. Rizzuti will be speaking with veteran engine builder Keith Dorton. Topics should range from Dorton's experience with both NASCAR and the Hooters Pro Cup Series to shared memories of his late brother Randy.

To top it all off, Cason visits with IRL driver Graham Rahal, the youngest winner in IRL history. Bobby's son shares his thoughts on the current state of the unified IRL and racing in general.

This is an ambitious agenda for the re-vamped show. Since there are almost no independent TV series covering NASCAR in the marketplace today, it should be interesting to see just how Three Wide Life does over the next several months.

Click here for the Three Wide Life website that has details on where the show airs across the country.

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NBC's "Today Show" A Curious Choice For Gordon

A while back, NASCAR packed-up all twelve of The Chase drivers and shipped them off to New York City. This "media tour" was aimed at putting these personalities in front of a national television audience.

The guys did the mandatory "Top Ten" list on David Letterman. The next day, they headed to The Early Show on CBS and Good Morning America over on ABC. One place they did not visit was The Today Show on NBC. There was no interest in NASCAR at 30 Rock.

NBC left NASCAR under difficult circumstances. Fans do have great memories of Allen Bestwick and the late Benny Parsons covering the sport's top series. They also have the words of Brian France ringing in their ears. In NBC's final season, France blamed lower TV ratings on the fact NBC was busy promoting its NFL agenda.

Clearly the strangest thing that happened during 2006 was the attempt by Dateline NBC to stage an elaborate sting operation during the Sprint Cup Series race in Martinsville, VA. Click here for the story from NASCAR.com editor Duane Cross about the set-up. Click here for the reaction from the law enforcement community.

This little stunt of having "rent-a-Muslims" spread prayer rugs and kneel to pray next to the Martinsville Speedway ticket office not only got no reaction from the fans but also offended Muslims nationwide.

Many NASCAR fans wrote to NBC and suggested if they wanted to start fights they could save money and simply put a Dateline reporter in a Jeff Gordon T-shirt.

It certainly seems more than a bit ironic that Gordon is being promoted for an appearance on NBC's Today Show on Thursday morning. While this same program was apparently not interested in visiting with Chase drivers like Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Tony Stewart, they are rolling-out the red carpet for Gordon and his Sprint Cup Series car. Want to know the reason why?

In the middle of The Chase, in the middle of a global economic crisis and smack-dab in the middle of a crippling fuel shortage in the Southeastern US, Jeff Gordon is changing the paint scheme on his Hendrick Chevrolet. Well, at least that is what the Hendrick gang is selling to The Today Show.

NASCAR fans have seen Gordon on TV run all kinds of paint schemes and wear all kinds of firesuits. Nicorette and Pepsi come to mind as two that are probably the most familiar. So, what Gordon is really changing is his DuPont paint scheme. Same sponsor, just different colors. That gets live coverage on The Today Show.

Over the years, Gordon has got to tool his Chevrolet through Times Square during the annual NASCAR parade before the Sprint Cup Series banquet. This one little publicity stunt tied-up traffic and was such a logistical mess that this season NASCAR has quietly cancelled it.

So, look for a COT with a tarp on it outside of Rockefeller Center on Thursday morning surrounded by some of New York's finest. Perhaps, as Gordon removes the cover and lets America see his new 2009 paint scheme he might mention a couple of topics other than DuPont and Hendrick Motorsports.

Suggestions might include Talladega on Sunday and The Chase for the Championship. That is, once all the important business is out of the way.

Update: Gordon will also appear on ESPN2's First Take after 10AM on Thursday to promote his new paint scheme.

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