New Series Rumor…again UPDATE: CBS, the first network to carry a Winston Cup race live from start to finish, a daring decision back in 1979, has been approached or will soon be approached about a proposed new stock-car racing series, according to NASCAR sources. And various stock-car teams have been approached to gauge interest in such a venture, according to team owners. Winston Cup team owners have been watching Fox’s on-camera handling of car sponsors with an increasingly skeptical eye, some noting that Fox’s coverage at times appears to be avoiding or downplaying teams whose sponsors haven’t bought into the big TV advertising package(Winston Salem Journal)(3-19-2001) UPDATE: Last weekend there were reports that CBS might be interested in counter-programming a new racing series. Now ABC executives have confirmed that such talks have taken place at their network. ABC and CBS have invested some 20 years in Winston Cup coverage, but they lost out in bidding to Fox and NBC for the next six years. When asked about the possibility of a package of counter-programming to NASCAR on Fox and NBC, Mark Quenzel, the senior vice president of programming for ESPN, said: “I know it’s been brought up once or twice in the last year, that various people have discussed it. But my opinion is that this isn’t football or baseball, where you have fields all over the country. There aren’t that many race tracks, and the ones you do have are pretty much tied up. It would be very tough to start a competitive series. That is an expensive sport to run.(Winston Salem Journal)(3-26-2001)
