NASCAR Cup Series

Plug pulled on Fox's planned post-race online wrap

Published Apr. 19, 2010 12:55 a.m. ET

foxsports

Fox's plan for extended post-race NASCAR coverage in an online program was wiped out even before Sunday's race at Texas got postponed by rain.

After Fox's network broadcast last weekend in Phoenix ran 50 minutes past its allotted time, there wasn't time to follow up on several prominent story lines. That prompted the plan to provide post-race coverage on its Web site.

``Unfortunately, due to contractual limitations that we had hoped to overcome, FOX Sports is unable to extend its post-race coverage on FOXSports.com,'' Fox said in a statement Sunday. ``Since this would have been a commercial-free undertaking, our goal was simply to have all parties agree that this would only benefit NASCAR fans, but obviously that didn't happen.''

Turner Sports owns online video rights to NASCAR content and operates NASCAR.com.

In response to Fox, Turner issued its own statement Sunday touting its in-depth coverage on NASCAR.com going into and following each race.

``NASCAR.COM has also consistently partnered with other media companies - including Fox's sister network SPEED TV, to further enhance the offerings to NASCAR's loyal fan base,'' the Turner statement read. ``NASCAR.COM has proactively approached Fox over a period of time with a variety of collaborative online media options that unfortunately have been rejected.''

Fox had only brief interviews with the top three finishers in Phoenix. There was no time to follow-up with Denny Hamlin, who received considerable coverage for racing just 10 days after knee surgery, or Kyle Busch, who lost the race because of a late caution.

NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said Fox and Turner have contracts with NASCAR that ``serve our fans very well.''

``We expect our partners to respect and abide by the rights that are in place,'' Poston said. ``FOX provides excellent coverage of the race on broadcast and NASCAR.com provides 24-7 coverage including a significant amount of content postrace.''