Courtesy USA Today

(October 8, 2009) NASCAR says its fans demanded more consistent starting times for Sprint Cup races. In the face of falling ratings for the first three Chase for the Sprint Cup events, its TV networks were more than happy to oblige.
"We started to tamper with something that we shouldn't have," Fox Sports chairman David Hill said Wednesday. "I'll put my hand up and say, 'Guilty.' "

Hill was among those who favored later start times for races, such as a 3:20 p.m. start for the Daytona 500. Next year's season opener will start at 1 p.m. ET (its earliest start since 2003), one of 20 races to begin at that time. West Coast races will start at 3 p.m. ET, and night races at 7:30 p.m., except the 5:45 p.m. green flag for the Coca-Cola 600, which is held Memorial Day weekend.

There will be 28 of 36 races that will start earlier in 2010. In consulting a 25,000-member fan council, NASCAR found half often weren't aware when a race started.

In Ipsos research of NASCAR fans, more than two-thirds preferred early afternoon Sunday times with 1 p.m. being the most appealing. Fans said the leading reasons were because they preferred watching races directly after church and lunch.

Hill said NASCAR is "60 years old, but it's got a tradition like it's 500 years old, and you don't mess with that. ... (With later start times), we realize that even though we're artificially trying to goose the (rating), it wasn't doing us any good whatsoever with that core fan that created this sport and turned it from a regional sport into a major national sport."

Hill expects ratings might decline next year in Fox's first half of the schedule but believes they could rise during the Chase.

"What we're all interested in is not short-term but long-term growth," Hill said. "A season that the fans realize that the racing is going to be on at 1 o'clock, 3 o'clock or 7:30, and the Daytona 500 will be starting at 1, that the growth will start to come. We believe firmly by making this move, it's going to give us long-term ratings growth, because we're giving the fans what they want."

ESPN came out earlier this season in favor of an earlier race start. That network had a rain issue last season when coverage of its Phoenix race spilled into prime time on ABC during November sweeps. The network shifted the conclusion of the race to ESPN.

The move also is welcomed by track promoters such as Daytona International Speedway president Robin Braig, who says he fielded thousands of e-mails, letters and phone calls from fans begging for an earlier start. Many cited not being able to get to work on time Monday, or having to stay an extra night in a hotel. This year's rain-shortened Daytona 500 race also likely would have been run the full distance with an earlier green flag.

"It's the second-most popular reason why fans are considering not coming back behind the economy," Braig said. "We'll sell more Daytona 500 tickets this year because of the time change."

Roger VanDerSnick, vice president of International Speedway Corp. that owns Daytona and 11 other tracks with Cup races, said the starting times also would "increase the radius of marketing tickets to people who want to drive home the same day.

"If you start two hours earlier, you have two more hours on the back side to get home," VanDerSnick said. "It allows us to bring in fans from a larger distance and still give them the opportunity to get back to work on Monday after a Sunday race."

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