Everybody knew how to tune into the South Carolina 400 race. With Dale Earnhardt Jr. bringing back his iconic No. 8 Budweiser colors to Florence Motor Speedway, the anticipation was huge. Crowds flocked to the track and thousands streamed exclusively on FloRacing, the streaming home of all NASCAR Regional properties. Unfortunately, a multitude of issues popped up to hinder a smooth racetrack experience.

The broadcast booth dwindled in terms of number. Where Eric Brennan, Blake McCandless, and James Pike were all supposed to call the race, only one of them ended up acting as a one-man army. Then Internet services unexpectedly crashed, hindering both track officials’ work and fans’ experience. Yet Dale Jr. came forward to absolve FloRacing of any fault, citing a joint effort.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. clears up a tense situation

The last time the No. 8 Budweiser car soared to Victory Lane, it was at the 2006 Crown Royal 400 race in Richmond. So as Dale Earnhardt Jr. unveiled the same car after 17 years, fans were pumped to see some of that past glory. And Junior delivered – despite a poor qualifying effort seeing him start 40th on the grid, the veteran methodically moved into the top 20 within the first 50 laps. By the halfway 10-minute pit stop break, he had passed Late Model ace Josh Berry and nestled in 2nd place behind race leader Treyten Lapcevich, until an engine failure caused him to end the race in 28th place. However, this lively action was all the more reason why fans were wildly disappointed with FloRacing – because its broadcast failed inexplicably.

However, Dale Earnhardt Jr. opened up in a Dale Jr. Download episode and proceeded to acquit the charges on FloRacing. He broached the topic of how the whole system was overloaded due to the overwhelming crowds. “This is a facility that manages probably anywhere from 1500 to 2000 on the great night. They have what they need in terms of Internet and all those things… I don’t think they could have prepared for what they were gonna have in terms of how much the whole system would be loaded by not only the fans that were there – if anybody was using the Wifi – and all the staff, people piling up onto the internet service. And then the broadcast feed being shipped from there to Concord.”

On top of that, FloRacing and NASCAR Regional worked together in this venture. Following the broadcast failure, both issued apologies to upset fans. So Dale Earnhardt Jr. continued, “So Flo…is the front-end of the broadcast…But the producing, the editing, the directing – is all NASCAR Productions. They just announced that they have extended their partnership… Flo and NASCAR Productions worked together to bring this broadcast to you. I don’t think that they anticipated how stressed and over-stressed that system would be. Before the race started, the track’s internet quit… and apparently plan B was not working well.”

Amidst this chaos, one of FloRacing’s employees ended up carrying the racing partner’s reputation on its back.

A one-man army held it all together

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On-track chaos marred the South Carolina 400 race. Before the mid-point of the race, Mason Diaz and Conner Jones collided and crashed under caution. Then the two proceeded to engage in a brawl that officials soon untangled. However, authorities could not easily solve the other chaotic problem that emerged – broadcasting trouble.

Multiple times during the race, the audio cut out, the stream cut out, and sometimes both happened simultaneously. So FloRacing pit reporter James Pike was elevated to play-by-play and color commentator all at once. Standing on top of a trailer, Pike used his microphone, IFB comms, and the Race Monitor app to keep track of the running order and deliver a watch-worthy race to the fans.

He had help – Travis aka Moonhead was the cameraman who livestreamed the race and gave updates on the running order. Pike outlined how he managed this magnanimous task. “Also, to clarify here: it was me, my microphone, my IFB and the @RaceMonitor app – but the act of reading timing and scoring on that app I learned through all my @iRacing shows looking at the live timing window of @appgineerin’s ATVO. Credit to both programs in this case.” 

Given this huge duty executed by FloRacing, Dale Earnhardt Jr. delivered his verdict: “I believe that Flo is a good partner – I don’t think that Flo is skimping on quality in the resources needed to put these things together.” 

Evidently, FloRacing went all out to prevent the race from falling apart. So Dale Earnhardt Jr. protected its reputation despite the broadcasting disaster.