Daytona 500: Iconic Race Is Sonic Centerpiece of Fox Sports' Speedweeks Sound from track, road courses is produced by sparse, spread-out audio crew By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Thursday, February 11, 2021 - 1:08 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021 Daytona 500 and Speedweeks events will look a little different, the iconic race's website advises. Its sound, however, will be as big and as loud as ever.
2021 NASCAR Speedweeks started Feb. 9 with the Busch Clash invitational on the Daytona road course, followed on successive days by the Daytona 500 qualifying runs, the Bluegreen Vacations Duel that determines main-race starting positions, the NextEra Energy 250 Camping World Trucks match, and the Lucas Oil 200 Driven By General Tire race, all leading up to the main event - the Daytona 500 - on Valentine's Day.
The audio crew will have been onsite long before that - or, more precisely, onsites. Like many sports events over the past year, the big race will have many of its crew members working remotely. At Daytona International Speedway will be Fox Sports A1 Kevin McCloskey, aboard Game Creek Cleatus remote-production truck, and submixer Chip Weaver, in the stadium. Supporting them will be Andy Roston, working race car and truck comms from New York; Radio Editor Jeff Bratta, working from home in Georgia; and Radio Mixer Zach Bayer, at home in Richmond, VA, on a Calrec Brio console. The tape operator is in Pittsburgh, and video editing is done at Fox Sports studios in Charlotte, NC. Doug Wilson, in charge of comms, is at the Speedway.
The technical diaspora is significantly larger than last year's, the first time a sizable REMI effort produced this race event. That included real-time commentary by experts Larry McReynolds and Jamie McMurray from a bespoke multi-purpose virtual-studio set deployed in the Fox Sports Charlotte studios for the pre- and post-race shows. The signals were transmitted over fiber and transferred to MADI for the onsite audio mixers.
This year, team communications radio is being moved via Unity Intercom's internet-based AoIP platform, an estimated 64 channels each direction, and is converted to MADI for use on the broadcast campus.
Last year's race saw the first inklings of REMI, with some technical and talent participants located in Los Angeles and Charlotte, reductions and dispersions that observers attribute to a combination of COVID and industry economics.
This year, says McCloskey, there are fewer people overall but many fewer onsite. But, after using [at-home production] this way for football and eight races last year, we've gotten it to the point where it works very well. It's reliable. The Daytona 500 is a huge endeavor, and spreading it around like this increases the complexity, but it's still very manageable.
There is a lot to handle. For instance, Bayer is taking in communications from 40 cars - driver, crew chief, and spotter for each, all three on a single RF channel - with frequency management by NASCAR's Racing Electronics subsidiary. The addition of a road course on Daytona's roval course adds a new wrinkle: right-hand turns, among other things. The Busch Clash will be one of three such stock-car road races this season.
The road-race sound is more intimate and more discrete than the Daytona 500's, notes McCloskey. They're taking the turns at slower speeds, so you can hear more of individual cars instead of the huge roar of the 500, picking up sounds from wherever the cameras are along the course.
One thing that's not changing is Crank It Up, the SFX drum solo that Fox inserts at some point during the race. Made up of a mix directly from Weaver's Calrec Artemis submix console sent through McCloskey's main mix, it which sounds awesome in surround.
Everyone loves Crank It Up,' says McCloskey. Can't imagine doing this race without it.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
02/06/2026
Musically intelligent soft synth gets upgraded
Scaler Music will be probably be best known to many for their music theory tools, but their product range al...
02/06/2026
Powerful new vocal-production tool announced
Described as a vocal performance station , Klevgrand's latest plug-in combines pitch-correction with harmo...
02/06/2026
Launched alongside Go Green sale extension
McDSP have just released the latest addition to their APB line-up, DC-2 Dual Compressor, and have also announced ...
02/06/2026
Create custom tools for Ableton Live 12 Suite
Ableton have just introduced a new open JavaScript toolkit that allows anyone to create their own custom tools...
02/06/2026
Now features full H90 algorithm library
Eventide have announced the upcoming launch of the H9 Harmonizer Gen 2, a new and improved version of their hugely p...
02/06/2026
Plus UAD Half Yearly Sale now live
The latest arrival to the Universal Audio range delivers a new native pitch-correction plug-in that's capable of deli...
02/06/2026
Rohde & Schwarz to present comprehensive performance, conformance and spectrum-m...
02/06/2026
BTL Laboratory becomes Taiwan's first test house with a CTIA Certification c...
02/06/2026
blueCORE standalone processors headline solutions designed to simplify the trans...
02/06/2026
If you've kept up with this article series, you know by now where to start w...
02/06/2026
With new DSP configurations and flexible licensing options, Calrec is removing the barriers to virtualised audio, giving broadcasters the freedom to scale produ...
02/06/2026
The TV agency was one of the earliest adopters of Nielsen's local television...
02/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/06/2026
Grass Valley today announced that Australian News Channel (ANC), operator of Sky News Australia, has deployed Grass Valley AMPP to transform its newsroom produc...
02/06/2026
Studio Technologies, a leading manufacturer of high-quality audio, video, and fiber-optic solutions, announces its new Model 385 Mic/Intercom Beltpack. The Mode...
02/06/2026
The Riedel Group today announced the appointment of Gudrun Scharler as CEO of Riedel Networks. She succeeds Michael Martens, who has led Riedel Networks since 2...
02/06/2026
More signals, higher quality, and outstanding ingest and streaming flexibility deliver professional results in a small, all-in-one footprint...
02/06/2026
farmerswife will be featured on the Modena Media & Entertainment stand at this year's Mediatech Africa 2026, giving visitors an opportunity to explore the l...
02/06/2026
PTZOptics will showcase a new generation of intelligent video workflows at InfoComm 2026, June 17 19, Las Vegas. Visitors to booth N8227 will see how PTZOptics ...
02/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/06/2026
Wuppertal June 2, 2026
Gudrun Scharler Appointed CEO of Riedel Networks The Riedel Group today announced the appointment of Gudrun Scharler as CEO of Riedel N...
02/06/2026
Back to All News
Discover Your Next Book-to-Screen Obsession With Our New Dedicated Hub
Product
02 June 2026
Global
Link copied to clipboard
Dear most vor...
02/06/2026
New LinkedIn Data: 90% of C-Suite Leaders are Continuously Building Skills to Lead in the AI Era Published on Jun 2, 2026 Categories: Data and insights
Lin...
02/06/2026
Trust has become a commercial issue With global advertising spend forecast to exceed US$1 trillion this year*, the commercial consequences of weak governance co...
02/06/2026
June sees Ireland's cultural calendar in full bloom, as RT Supporting the Arts showcases a vibrant and wide-ranging programme spanning music, theatre, visu...
02/06/2026
After The Traitors Ireland launched in 2025, Irish audiences proved to have a taste for the global hit reality show. This Bank Holiday Monday fans can indulge e...
01/06/2026
In its sixth year, the broadcaster's coverage has become a global brand and ...
01/06/2026
Designed to solve a common problem in broadcasting, the automated workflow detects, identifies, removes, and documents copyrighted music
AudioShake has introdu...
01/06/2026
The sports-analytics company combines its data with proprietary AI to help leagu...
01/06/2026
Category line-up & sponsors announced
Photo: Paul Clarke
The Production Music Awards (PMA) have announced that submissions are now officially open ahead of...
01/06/2026
New hybrid sample/synthesis instrument revealed
Excite Audio have just released the latest instalment in their Evolve series, which has been developed in co...
01/06/2026
Latest TONEX expansion captures three rare vintage amps
The newest addition to IK Multimedia's ever-growing TONEX line-up introduces a set of three incr...
01/06/2026
Musically intelligent soft synth gets upgraded
Scaler Music will be probably be best known to many for their music theory tools, but their product range al...
01/06/2026
SBS confirms its broadcast sponsors for FIFA World Cup 2026
1 June, 2026
Media releases
SBS has secured Hyundai, Hisense, Macca's, Rexona, bet365, Com...
01/06/2026
Rohde & Schwarz Satellite Industry Days 2026 guided by the motto From Earth to ...
01/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
01/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
01/06/2026
Marshall Electronics is showcasing a comprehensive lineup of next-generation POV cameras, purpose-built to power today's connected AV environments, at InfoC...
01/06/2026
Adobe Announces Concept to Vector
Deepa Subramaniam June 1, 2026
0 Comments
One of the biggest frustrations we hear from designers is how difficult it...
01/06/2026
Vampire Feature Night Patrol Graded with DaVinci Resolve Studio
Brie Clayton June 1, 2026
0 Comments
Colorist shapes dark, gritty tone for horror thri...
01/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
01/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
Daytona 500: Iconic Race Is Sonic Centerpiece of Fox Sports' Speedweeks Sound from track, road courses is produced by sparse, spread-out audio crew By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
