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Motorsport

Thoughts on Three New Zealand airing NASCAR races live for free online this season with Shane Van Gisbergen set to begin his first full season in the US soon

by Sports Benches

Image Reference: Zach Catanzareti via Wikipedia, CC BY 2.0

You wouldn’t believe it by surprise as New Zealand will get live NASCAR coverage this season & it’s free to view too without a subscription where ThreeNow will stream every race of both Cup & Xfinity Series while continuing to one-hour highlights on Sundays through their CRC Motorsports show on the main Three TV channel. It’s brilliant timing ahead of Shane Van Gisbergen’s first full season racing NASCARs in the US starting soon, although the new racing season will return on Monday morning beginning with the non-points Busch Clash race at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

As said, it’s exciting times for NZ’s own SVG who will compete full-time in the Xfinity Series including a few part-time Cup races with Kaulig Racing under loan development for the year from Team Trackhouse. Yes, he will have to race the ARCA main series opener at Daytona on his first racing weekend out of 2024, but that’s only for him to pass the superspeedway requirements by NASCAR before he’s allowed to raced there. He has never done it before other than road courses where he made his name in Supercars while he won at Chicago on his Cup debut + raced on a short oval with Niece Motorpsorts in Trucks last year. He won’t be lost at Trackhouse after all despite the late change due to AJ Allmendinger’s return to the Xfinity Series also to Kaulig as his new team-mate. They are preparing him well at the right place ahead of racing Cup level full-time in 2025 & beyond either in their potential third car or possibly replacing Daniel Suarez in the No.99 Chevy Camaro.

So what does that mean for Australia? It will still be on Fox Sports/Kayo every week Live for all Cup and Xfinity races where you would need to pay at $25 a month to watch these races behind a paywall. Yes, it didn’t cost that much for Three to stump up the money in order to show races live legally now in NZ. Speaking of Three, they are owned by Warner Bros Discovery whose parent cable channel TNT will return to the sport next year under the next Domestic TV rights contract (five late summer races live alongside Max as a sports streaming add-on with all 2nd half practice & qualifying events via TruTV).

But despite the Three NASCAR deal in NZ, don’t see NASCAR coming back on free-to-air in Australia anytime soon even it’s only one-hour highlights like IndyCar. Anyone can watch YouTube at anytime for a few mins highlights from the race without having to sit few hours each time & there’s always full race replays during the mid-week too that is all for free worldwide.

We don’t even know what is happening with Brodie Kostecki right now after he shockingly decided to leave Erebus Motorsport in Supercars this week not long before the new season starts soon despite winning the championship. I hope he can come back sometime this season & race part-time at Cup level again with Richard Childress Racing. There’s still always hope to see an Australian racing in NASCAR though every week alongside SVG whether it’s with or without Kostecki. Plus, you got Tickford Racing’s Cameron Waters potentially racing a few road course races there later this year for RFK Racing’s 3rd part-time vehicle in a Ford Mustang & he’s so passionate about this sport, having visited 1-2 races at Martinsville I (April) & Daytona II (August) last year.

For now, NZ Motorsport fans can enjoy watching NASCAR races live for free every Sunday & Monday thanks to ThreeNow. But for us Australians, don’t hold your breath when most top-level motorsports content is behind a paywall – even with an Aussie and SVG in there when most people are at work during the day except when you can Xfinity Series races on most Sundays.

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Motorsport

Watkins Glen: Larson scores second straight win, Raikkonen retires in Nascar debut

by Admin

Kyle Larson claimed victory in a thrilling race at Watkins Glen International that was delayed several times due to bad weather. It was the second straight win for the defending Nascar Cup Series champion and his 18th career win overall. In a dramatic finish, Larson made a great maneuver to pass Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott. Despite ultimately finishing the race in fourth place, Elliott finished the regular season of the Nascar championship in first place, which he secured by winning the first place after the first stage at Watkins Glen.

After the race, Larson commented on a key maneuver in the race: “I knew that was my only opportunity to get by him. I feel like our cars were pretty equal today. Had a lot of fun after the green-flag cycle trying to chase him down. Kind of burned my stuff up a little bit.” But the restarts kept me in it and kept our team in it. I’m proud of my guys. Good to get another win here at Watkins Glen and get some more bonus points going into the Playoffs, we haven’t had a lot here this year.” Elliot congratulated his teammate on the victory: “Congratulations to Kyle and everybody on the 5 team and at Hendrick Motorsports for getting the win.” AJ Allmendinger and Joey Logano finished the race ahead of Elliott.

The race at Watkins Glen was special because never before had a larger number of international drivers had the opportunity to compete in a single race within the Nascar Cup Series. At the aforementioned race, we had the opportunity to watch drivers from as many as seven countries. Most of the drivers are, quite logically, competitors from the USA. In addition, at Watkins Glen we had the opportunity to see drivers from Mexico, the Netherlands, Germany, Russia, Finland and England. This data shows that Nascar is becoming more and more popular outside the American continent from year to year. Of the international drivers at Watkins Glen, the best position was achieved by Daniel Suarez, who took fifth place.

The mentioned race, which is the penultimate in the regular part of the season, was marked by the debut of Kimi Raikkonen, the former world champion in F1. His debut performance in Nascar ended in ingloriously, although at one point the Finnish driver was among the top ten ranked drivers. Kimi started the race in the 27th position, and at one point he was occupying a high eighth position. Unfortunately, he ended the race prematurely by crashing into the guard rail. Regardless of the fact that he finished the race in the mentioned way, Raikkonen is satisfied with the new experience in his already rich racing career.

“Yeah, for sure, but it’s always hard to know especially now here like what states (of the pit) stop and you know the tire life on that,” he said. “I felt that we had very good speed and especially after the pit stops but maybe I was a bit too harsh on the tires on the one of the sets.”

The other internationals didn’t make a name for themselves at Watkins Glen either. The best place was achieved by the German driver, Mike Rockenfeller, who finished the race in 30th place. Dutchman Loris Hezemans was three positions lower. At the very back with Raikkonen were his former colleague from F1, Daniel Kvyat and the Englishman Kyle Tilley.

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