Whenever sports fans are talking about commercials, it’s usually to complain about how they are ruining their favorite sporting event with their obnoxious frequency. But that was not the case for Fox’s coverage of the Daytona 500 on Sunday.
NASCAR’s season opening and biggest race was once again plagued by bad weather. After President Donald Trump took center stage for a lengthy appearance, only a few laps were able to be completed before a several hour rain delay.
That delay did push the Daytona 500 into the primetime hours for Fox. And the race came to an exciting, if not predictable conclusion with some late crashes and drama that are the hallmark of super-speedway restrictor plate racing. William Byron won his second straight Daytona 500 after evading the wreckage of leaders Denny Hamlin and Austin Cindric.
While the nature of the Daytona 500 being decided more based on luck or skill is a very real conversation amongst NASCAR fans and even its drivers after Byron was in the right place at the right time, what isn’t up for debate is the improvement in Fox’s race coverage when it comes to the number of full screen commercial breaks.
Full screen ads were cut down by almost two-thirds from the 2025 race compared to the 2024 race and overall commercials were shortened by four minutes.
Per @Jayski, NASCAR on FOX had just 18 minutes of full-screen ads this year in the Daytona 500, compared to 46 mins last year.
In all, this year had four fewer minutes of commercials than last year (53 mins vs 57). #NASCAR #Daytona500
— Jonathan Fjeld (@Jonathan_Fjeld) February 17, 2025
Instead of going full screen, Fox committed more ads to their side-by-side technique, showing live racing action in a split screen with commercials. It’s a tactic also seen on golf telecasts with “Playing Through” coverage. We’ve even seen it pop up in NFL games from time to time, but usually as teams are coming in or out of timeout and not threatening any actual game action.
And as Sports Business Journal notes, the new commercial strategy not only comes with a new rights deal, but the presence of commercial free F1 races on ESPN.
The move is important in part because some NASCAR fans in the U.S. have been putting pressure on broadcasters to lighten ad loads ever since ESPN started airing rival property F1 without ads in 2018, even though the media rights economics of the two series are dramatically different stateside. NBC Sports first experimented with a similar format during three playoff races last year.
While Fox used the side-by-side boxes early and often throughout the Daytona 500 broadcast, several users on social media said they were pleased by not having to miss any racing action. In past years, NASCAR broadcasters including Fox would at times go to full-screen commercials while racing was taking place, particularly if there weren’t many yellow-flag caution periods that allowed for ad breaks during natural stops in the action.
And in more good news for NASCAR fans, Fox will use a similar commercial strategy for the remaining races on their broadcast network this season. FS1 races will see increased side-by-side ads, but still more full screen ads than the races on big Fox.
In the first year of a new rights deal with Fox, Amazon, TNT, and NBC all televising or streaming cup races, there has been a thought that NASCAR has their work cut out for them to reach fans and make sure they know where races are airing. Starting off a new television era with fewer commercials and more action is a great place to start.
