NBC Sports Throwing the Kitchen Sink' at NASCAR Chicago Street Race NBC says first NASCAR Cup Series street-course event promises to be our Daytona 500' By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Wednesday, June 28, 2023 - 3:46 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
NBC Sports Tech Manager Matt Hogencamp calls the first-ever NASCAR Cup Series Street Race, scheduled to take place in Chicago on Sunday, July 2, our high-water mark. More than 90 cameras are expected to be deployed, including 11 hard cameras, five RF cameras, six wired handhelds, eight super-slo-mos, and 25 robotic systems. A1 Bryan Korot describes the event as our Daytona 500.
In short, everyone is looking for an analogy to describe something they've never experienced before.
For Korot, the uniqueness of the situation - the first-ever NASCAR Cup race held on a downtown street course - was driven home when he did some remote walk-throughs of the route with driver and NBC Sports pit reporter Parker Kligerman.
Before, Korot says, we had been looking at renderings and graphics showing nice trees and parks; it looked more like Miami. Then you see the buses and the cabs, and it really hits you: this is downtown Chicago, and they're going to run a race here.
NASCAR takes to the streets of Chicago on Sunday, July 2.
He expects to have about 10 Calrec Hydra boxes deployed along the course, along with several Dante throw-down boxes specifically for roar mics. The actual mic count is still being calculated, but the likely camera count is around 90, and each will have a microphone attached.
The audio crew will also be commensurately larger: Korot counts 15 staffers, versus the 11 typically on hand, and two A2s are assigned to an overnight shift to deploy microphones as the city closes the street ahead of the race.
Submixer Steve Urick, working from Game Creek Edit 1, will have his hands full. The track layout will likely cause cars to bunch up in certain turns, significantly increasing the SPL at those points. That sound, picked up by one of the dozens of stereo mics attached to cameras at the turns, will be managed the old-fashioned way: with fingers on faders and the occasional mic pad and some optimistically pre-adjusted gain levels.
The real unknown in the race, though, is the new NASCAR exhaust design, part of the Next Gen car design introduced last year. This race will be only the second time NASCAR Cup cars are outfitted with mufflers, part of the actions being taken by race organizers to head off concerns about noise; in the future, they will be used only on short tracks and street courses.
This time, [the organizers] went with headers and side pipes on both sides of the car, which is a dramatic difference from the [previous] Xfinity and Cup cars, explains Urick, who will also be mixing a stereo microphone in each car, handled by wireless provider BSI, delivering interior ambient sound around the driver/crew comms on-air. On those, the sound came mostly from one side only. Here, we'll have to listen for when the downshifts and RPM changes occur, and that will depend on how some drivers ride the brakes instead of shifting where we'd expect them to. Some will, some won't.
The big challenge, he continues, will be building and managing over 80 inputs across multiple layers of the console, keeping up with the possibilities of each lap as well as with where [director] Sean Owens is taking it: a turn can either be a camera on a lift or a robo down low. Either way, the audio has to follow it.
Video is also bigger and with some new wrinkles. Hogencamp forecasts an unprecedented nine dual-path cameras per car, for a total of 36 in-car cameras during the race. The potential for new angles will be amazing, he says.
A view of NBC Sports' Peacock Pit Box in Grant Park.
The new in-car [cameras], he explains, will do a cut from hanging alongside and, [as the driver goes] to pass somebody, looking at the side pan or cutting to the rear-bumper camera to be able to show the car as they go past it. There'll be 36 options of ways to show what's happening literally on the track in Chicago.
The Windy City races will also have two drones, from NBC Sports' partner Beverly Hills Aerial, with one up in the air at all times, transmitting via BSI. According to Hogencamp, the smaller of the two, the Hummingbird, can reach into spaces that the more powerful larger drones can't get to because of their size and noise.
We're throwing the kitchen sink at Chicago, he laughs. That's going to be our prime event for this year. The amount of planning that has gone into that and bringing everything together is enormous. I did my first site survey in October while we were still in our NASCAR season and have been living and breathing it ever since. We're looking at it and planning for it the same way we do for the Indy 500. It's going to be a spectacle is how I would describe it. It's going to be a showcase this year for NBC's NASCAR coverage.
The Ultimate Challenge': Televising a Brand-New Race NBC Sports VP, NASCAR Production and Motorsports, Jeff Behnke; producer Rene Hatlelid; and director Sean Owens mapped out the camera positions for the first-ever production.
It's the ultimate challenge to be the first people to televise a race at a course that has never been televised before, says NBC Sports Executive Producer Sam Flood. Obviously, the sense of space and the spectacle of being in the middle of the city is important. [We're] going to shoot the race a little bit differently. You've got to shoot it to capture the size and the scope of what is being executed here. We're going to have two drones flying around to capture that energy. We'll have an overhead helicopter that's able to give us the spectacle as well.
In addit
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
02/05/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
01/05/2026
January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...
01/04/2026
January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION
Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
03/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
02/03/2026
NBC Sports selected Imaginary Forces to create the main title sequence for the M...
02/03/2026
The NFL announces the launch of the NFL Draft Innovation Challenge, a new crowds...
02/03/2026
The World Teleport Association (WTA) has named Skyline Communications' DataMiner SatOps solution as a finalist for the 2026 Teleport Technology of the Year ...
02/03/2026
Ventum Tech announces a strategic partnership with Pixotope, a real-time graphic...
02/03/2026
Victory , a free, ad-supported sports streaming service, announces the launch of...
02/03/2026
Global powerhouse Delta Goodrem to represent Australia at this year's Eurovi...
02/03/2026
SBS brings together prominent voices to discuss rising social division and seek ...
02/03/2026
NITV Unveils Wednesday Night Sport Night
Media releases
A Midweek Hub for Blak Sport
Flagship NRL program Over The Black Dot moves to Wednesdays at 9:30pm
...
02/03/2026
Rohde & Schwarz demonstrates FR1-FR3 carrier aggregation, advancing 6G readiness Rohde & Schwarz and Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. have reached another pivotal ...
02/03/2026
MELBOURNE, Fla., March 2, 2026 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) today announc...
02/03/2026
Harvey Norman tops New Zealand's biggest ad spenders as retail leads and telcos and beverages sure Auckland March 3, 2026 - Nielsen's New Zealand'...
02/03/2026
aconnic AG (ISIN: DE000A0LBKW6), Munich, and Arqit Quantum Inc. (Nasdaq: ARQQ, A...
02/03/2026
Advanced Systems Group, LLC (ASG), a technology and services provider for media creatives and content owners, has appointed Jody Boatwright as Chief Strategy Of...
02/03/2026
Lightware, an industry leader in signal management, is reinforcing its commitment to simplifying complex AV environments with the continued evolution of its TPN...
02/03/2026
ZEISS Cinema opens its doors to an exclusive screening, filmmakers Q&A and hands-on showcase of the new ZEISS Aatma lens family on Tuesday, March 10, 6:00-9:00 ...
02/03/2026
To expand the creative potential of the compact Astera QuikBeam, DoPchoice introduces the SNAPBAG Round. The new light-shaping accessory transforms the powerfu...
02/03/2026
Douglas Dubler
On a rooftop in New York City, veteran photographer Douglas Dubler watched the sun's angle shift across the urban landscape, his internal cl...
02/03/2026
ZEISS is expanding its Otus ML lens family with the introduction of the new ZEISS Otus ML 1.4/35. This manual-focus lens is designed for photographers who live ...
02/03/2026
Matthews Studio Equipment now offers the new Dinkum Systems White FlexiMount and Phone Mount Kit, a compact, highly adaptable setup for mobile content creation...
02/03/2026
Luxembourg, February 26, 2026 - SES and Africa Mobile Network (AMN) have expande...
02/03/2026
02 03 2026 - Media release Ausfilm and Screen Australia launch joint UK market initiative
Ausfilm and Screen Australia have announced Partner with Australia (...
02/03/2026
Monday 2 March 2026
Saturday Night Live UK announces writing team
L-R: Jonno Johnson; Charlie Skelton; Celya AB; Omar Badawy; Gr inne Maguire; Laura Claxton; ...
02/03/2026
Back to All News
Netflix Unveils the Trailer for 53 Sundays, the New Film by Cesc Gay
Entertainment
02 March 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Dis...
28/02/2026
With two features seen in Formula 1 coverage, the broadcaster aims to bring view...
28/02/2026
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth addresses a crowd of approximately 1,500 L3Harris employees in Camden, Arkansas, as part of his Arsenal of Freedom tour....
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Berklee Presents Mambo Mania: Eguie Castrillo and the Berklee All-Stars Big Band...
28/02/2026
Berklee Announces Two New Summer Programs in Los Angeles The Berklee Music Business Program and Electronic Music Production and Sound Design Workshop bring imme...
28/02/2026
AI-RAN is moving from lab to field, showing that a software-defined approach is ...
28/02/2026
Autonomous networks - intelligent, self-managing telecommunications operations -...
28/02/2026
Back to All News
Final Trailer for BEASTARS Final Season Part 2' Roars Tow...
28/02/2026
New way to intentionally discover molecular glues could expand drug discovery Scripps Research scientists and colleagues show how drugs that eliminate certain d...
27/02/2026
The E.W. Scripps Company names Oliver Gray as Vice President, Network Sports and...
27/02/2026
The Gotham Sports App, the exclusive direct-to-consumer streaming home of MSG Networks and the YES Network, is now available for purchase through Prime Video fo...
NBC Sports Throwing the Kitchen Sink' at NASCAR Chicago Street Race NBC says first NASCAR Cup Series street-course event promises to be our Daytona 500' By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
