Fox TV stuff: Fox has announced it will show nearly 50 hours of on-track coverage and more than 20 hours of studio programming in February on Fox, FX, Fox Sports Net and Speed Channel. By comparison, there were a total of 43 hours worth of coverage when Fox came to Daytona for the first time in 2001. The biggest changes have the 70-lap Bud Shootout being presented in prime time Feb. 8 on Fox, and the two 125-mile qualifying races to be carried by FX on Feb. 13. Fox Sports Net showed the 125-milers two years ago, which caused a furor among local cable subscribers who still don’t have that channel as part of their basic package. (Nationally, Fox Sports Net is available in more than 82 million homes compared to almost 80 million for FX.) The Daytona 500 is Feb. 16, with Fox scheduled to have an hour-long pre-race show at noon. Mike Joy, Darrell Waltrip and Larry McReynolds will return for their third year together of calling races, along with studio analysts Chris Myers and Jeff Hammond and pit reporters Jeanne Zelasko, Dick Berggren, Matt Yocum and Steve Byrnes. Fox has no plans to cover the end-of-the-year banquet from New York in the future, and understandably so. While hardly scientific, only 14 percent of those who responded to a survey on the Web site of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution described the telecast on TNT as “great.” Forty-two percent of the respondents called it “boring,” and another 44 percent said they didn’t watch. (Daytona Beach News Journal)(12-15-2002)
