Just because there is action elsewhere does not mean the audience should see anything other than a close up of the 48 car driving somewhere. I say 'somewhere' because, while the car is probably on the race track, the shot is usually so zoomed in that it could have been shot on a sound stage in Wyoming and no one be any the wiser.

Fox note: Perhaps we should try this once the NASCAR contract is up, it might save time and money.

It has been scientifically proven* that a NASCAR viewing audience is incapable of understanding speech when the video does not reflect what is being spoken about. For instance, if a driver's wife is being discussed, it is necessary not only to show her for a moment to establish why they should care about this person, but to continue to switch between her and the driver on the racetrack (and only these two) off and on for the next 5 minutes while feel good story is told in excruciating detail. 3 wide racing on the track, near wrecks, and in fact sometimes even wrecks should be preempted by these very important features.

When seeing a race, it is very important that the viewer is not distracted by too many things happening at once, like "cars passing each other" or "cars almost spinning out". While occasionally unavoidable, showing action on camera in real time is to be minimized -- Fox doesn't need lawsuits just because some fan died of a heart attack due to an excitement overdose. If a fan wants to know where their driver is, they are to use the obscenely slow-scrolling ticker at the top of the screen. If they can't stay awake for the 5 minutes it takes to go from 1-43, they don't deserve to know that Bobby Labonte is running in 29th place.

As a sidenote, it is essential that the viewer not get a good enough view of the action to know what's going on. Jeff Gordon may be getting closer to the lead every lap, but if he is never shown on camera (because the camera has been a closeup on each of the top 3 cars for the past 30 laps), when he finally interrupts the closeup to take the lead: SURPRISE! Great television. The viewer never saw it coming, unless miraculously they kept watching the ticker at the top for the time intervals without falling into a deep slumber.

Since replay is a magical timewarp system, it is capable of directly transporting the excitement of seeing something live to the viewer, even if they already know what will happen. For instance, some might argue that seeing 4 cars try to squeeze into turn one at Bristol in real time with an unknown result is more exciting than seeing it afterwards when it is clear that yes, the cars wrecked, or no, they didn't. This is nonsense. As such, it is unnecessary to react quickly to any accident that might occur. The viewer can wait a few minutes for the camera feed to switch, and in the mean time the confusion of the wildly shaking picture and excited noises from the announcer booth will build anticipation for the carnage. When the accident is first shown, it should be a closeup of the smoking, wrecked car, and certainly not a wide shot showing the other 42 drivers trying to dodge it.

Pit stops are strangely immune from rule #4. In fact, the audience will be inexorably glued to their seats, watching the quadruple split screen to see if Carl Edwards' crew will complete the pit stop in 12.6 instead of 12.8 seconds this time, advancing him one position on lap 55 of 300. Nevermind that during the commercial break he gained 3 spots on the track thanks to a grenade inexplicably detonating inside of Dale Jr's engine, or that Robby Gordon hit the wall 15 times in the 3 minutes Lowe's and Home Depot serenaded the audience with their tales of special deals on unique kinds of hacksaws. These things are secondary to the importance of pit-stops.

The rest of the cars are not important -- if a fan wants to see if Kenseth got his top 5, he or she can read the paper tomorrow. The winner should be shown riding around triumphantly for approximately 15 seconds, then commercials, and then interviews in victory circle with him. After all post race interviews, a brief rundown of the finishing order may be shown on screen, but this is not advised, as some viewers may change the channel afterwards as opposed to diligently waiting through the end of the program for the results we will not be showing them.

Think of commercial breaks as a sort of money-printing machine. More commercials = more money! It's a proven equation.

Unfortunately, fans have reacted negatively to overt commercial breaks. As such, "normal" commercial breaks should be kept to roughly a 1:2 ratio with race time. However, we can make up for this 66% of wasted time by filling up as much racing "coverage" with closeup of sponsor logos on the cars as they circle the track. Not only is this policy in line with some of the previous rules, but the sponsors will hopefully feel inclined to spread a few bucks our way as well.

One shudders to think how entertaining racing coverage could be if it were consistently covered that way.

Perhaps NFL coverage composed entirely of closeups of the players' eyes? For instance, one might talk about how manly Tom Brady is while zoomed in on his steely gaze, then briefly show Randy Moss and maybe that one running back? If the play is interesting, we can show a replay before the next one unfolds. Nobody wants to see a 2 yard gain anyway.