When NASCAR and FOX signed a seven-year media rights agreement in November 2023, fans expected thorough coverage of the races. But fast-forward to May 2026, and those expectations may not have been fully met. So one can only imagine the frustration among fans when they suddenly realized key information was never shown during the broadcast at The Glen.
It all started when clips and segments of Cody Ware’s major crash started making the rounds online. During the final stage of the race, Ware suffered a nasty crash as Josh Berry drove away from the incident with damage to his own car. Meanwhile, SVG was still battling for the lead. In the footage spreading online, fans could clearly see Ware lose control before slamming hard into the barrier.
Multiple users report that Ware was driving his limping car around for the rest of the laps after pitting several times in order to return to action. Somehow, amidst all this chaos, FOX actually managed not to broadcast anything about the incident. As Jeff Gluck noticed, “I’m guessing they didn’t see the actual incident live, just saw a wounded car.”
Now, this isn’t exactly the first time fans have witnessed a scene like this. Last year at the Chicago Street Race, Ware wrecked hard into a tire barrier. And given that he was buried deep in the barrier and couldn’t get going again, NASCAR waited to throw the caution, which drew heavy criticism from fans.
So, it is not exactly surprising that the present blunder left the fans fuming and made them direct their attention and frustration towards FOX for not showing crucial moments and instead focusing on random battles and unnecessary footage. The crash was actually rather important in this scenario.
Here’s the hard crash that Cody Ware had in the closing laps. Ware pitted several times afterwards before attempting to limp the wounded car to the checkered flag. Kind of surprised a hard crash like that wasn’t a caution? #NASCAR | #GoBowlingAtTheGlen
Provided the caution came out when Ware wrecked, the race would have played out very differently. There would have been another caution, another set of pit stops, and at least one more restart. But since it stayed green, we saw SVG win by 7 seconds.
And since the majority of the audience missed why the Marshalls didn’t throw caution flags when there was a car that was essentially limping throughout the lap live, they are unable to join in and comment on the decision. In such cases, it is quite evident that the broadcast struggles that FOX has with NASCAR would come up more often than necessary.
NASCAR fans drag FOX down over missed incidents. As soon as the fans realized that they had missed racing action again, they took to social media to express their anger and demand that NASCAR pull FOX’s broadcasting rights. The sentiment is clear: fans want better, more comprehensive coverage of every critical moment on the track.
