It has been said that a herd of cattle, once aflame to do so, will form into a stampede and hurtle forward with little concern for what is crushed beneath them. Much like these boisterous bovines, our racing heroes sometimes get a little unhinged on the track, and too many of them head for corners and turns at one time. This was on display at the Indy road course on Sunday, and fans (and, surely, the drivers) either hated the carnage, or loved the action. Something else that can vex a fan while watching an exciting race broadcast is the amount of commercials breaking up the action. For those fans who like to know precisely how many ads there were, and how much time they took during the broadcast, here is this week’s breakdown.
Race and Commercial Breakdown of the 2022 Verizon 200 at the Brickyard
Start time to record race/commercial periods: 2:44 PM
End time to record race/commercial periods: 5:46 PM
Total minutes of complete race broadcast: 182
Minutes of race broadcast: 152
Minutes of traditional commercials: 30
Minutes of side-by-side commercials: 11
Total number of commercials: 91
Total number of companies or entities advertised: 53
Total number of traditional commercials (not split-screen): 65
Total number of companies or entities advertised: 47
Total number of ‘Side-by-Side’ commercials during the broadcast (split-screen): 26
Total number of companies or entities advertised: 19
Number of times NBC utilized ‘Side-by-Side’ commercials during the broadcast: 4
Companies seen the most in commercials during this broadcast: Subway (5 times); T-Mobile (4 times); Toyota (4 times); Xfinity (3 times); WPXI (3 times); Giant Eagle (3 times); Auto-Owners Insurance (3 times); Carvana (3 times); Liberty Mutual (3 times)
Breakdown of what the commercials were, by category:
NBC/USA TV Previews/Promos:
IndyCar indycar.com on NBC/NBC Sports & Peacock – 2
Upcoming Cup race on NBC/NBC Sports Coca-Cola, Busch Beer, Xfinity, Geico NASCAR.com/tickets – 1
NFL nfl.com/ Hall of Fame Game on NBC & Peacock – 1
Golf on Golf Channel, NBC Sports & Peacock – 1
LPGA Golf on NBC & Peacock – 1
‘American Ninja Warrior’ nbc.com/american-ninja-warrior – 1
‘Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane’ on USA usanetwork.com/austin-dillons-life-in-the-fast-lane – 1
‘Monday Night Raw’ usanetwork.com/wwe-raw – 1
‘Password’ on NBC nbc.com/nbc-insider/nbc-password-host-keke-palmer-premiere-will-honor-betty-white – 1
‘Quantum Leap’ nbc.com/nbc-insider/quantum-leap-is-coming-back-to-nbc-this-fall – 1
‘Race for the Championship’ on USA – 1
‘Snake in the Grass’ usanetwork.com/snake-in-the-grass – 1
Total: 13
Local News/Sports/Points-of-Interest in Penna.
NBC local newswpxi.com – 3
Giant Eagle MyPerks GiantEagle.com/myperks – 3
Classic Chevrolet pittsburghchevrolet.net – 1
Total: 7
Restaurants/Food
Subway Subway.com – 3
Applebees applebees.com – 1
Coca-Cola cocacola.com – 1
McDonald’s mcdonalds.com – 1
Mountain Dew mountaindew.com/ – 1
Sonic sonicdrivein.com – 1
Total: 8
Car/Truck/Bike
Ram Trucks ram.com – 2
Ford ford.com #FordfortheBuilders – 2
Buyatoyota.com buyatoyota.com – 2
Advance Auto Parts advanceautoparts.com – 1
Carvana.com carvana.com – 1
GoodYear goodyear.com – 1
Safe Lite safelite.com – 1
Sunoco sunocoinc.com – 1
Toyota Sponsafier.com toyota.com/racing/sponsafier – 1
Toyota toyota.com (Christopher Bell) – 1
Vroom vroom.com – 1
Total: 14
Insurance/Health
Auto-Owners Insurance autoowners.com (Martin Truex Jr.) – 3
USAA.com usaa.com/jointoday – 2
Geico.com geico.com – 1
Liberty Mutual libertymutual.com – 1
Progressive progressive.com – 1
UPMCHealthPlan.com upmchealthplan.com/medicare – 1
Total: 9
Wireless Phone
T-Mobile t-mobile.com/ – 2
Verizon vzw.com – 2
Total: 4
Home Improvement
Kioti tractors kioti.com – 1
Total: 1
Financial
Ally Bank allybank.com (Alex Bowman) – 1
Total: 1
Technology
Xfinity.com xfinity.com – 2
Amazon amazon.com – 1
Total: 3
Products/Services for the Home and Personal Use
Trelegy trelegy.com – 2
Breztri breztri.com – 1
Skechers skechers.com (Rusty Wallace) – 1
Total: 4
Racing Related
NASCAR.com/tickets nascar.com/tickets – 1
Chicagoland Speedway chicagolandspeedway.com – 1
Total: 1
Race brdcast times: // Comm. brdcast times:
2:44 PM – 2:47 PM – 3 // 2:47 PM – 2:49 PM – 2
2:49 PM – 2:53 PM – 4 // 2:53 PM – 2:55 PM – 2
2:55 PM – 3:14 PM – 19 // 3:14 PM – 3:17 PM – 3
3:17 PM – 3:25 PM – 8 // 3:25 PM – 3:26 PM – 1
3:26 PM – 3:30 PM – 4 // 3:30 PM – 3:32 PM – 2
3:32 PM – 3:36 PM – 4 // 3:36 PM – 3:38 PM – 2
3:38 PM – 3:47 PM – 9 // 3:47 PM – 3:50 PM – 3
3:50 PM – 4:06 PM – 16 // 4:06 PM – 4:09 PM – 3
4:09 PM – 4:12 PM – 3 // 4:12 PM – 4:15 PM – 3
4:15 PM – 4:24 PM – 9 // 4:24 PM – 4:26 PM – 2
4:26 PM – 4:55 PM – 29 // 4:55 PM – 4:58 PM – 3
4:58 PM – 5:22 PM – 24 // 5:22 PM – 5:24 PM – 2
5:24 PM – 5:33 PM – 9 // 5:33 PM – 5:35 PM – 2
5:35 PM – 5:46 PM – 11 // 5:46 PM – checkered flag
Total race brdcst time: 152 // Total comm. brdcst time: 30
Number of companies featured during broadcast: 17
(Verizon; Coca-Cola; Monster Energy; Busch Beer; Ford Performance; Toyota; Geico; Advance Auto Parts; Credit One Bank; Ruoff Mortgag ruoff.com ; HighPoint.com ; Goldfish-Racing.com, Goldfish Casino Slots facebook.com/goldfishcasinoslots ; Xfinity; FedEx PGA Playoffs on Golf channel, NBC, & Peacock ; IndyCar on NBC & Peacock; NASCAR.com/Scanner ; NASCAR.com/Drive ; NASCAR.com/Mobile ; ‘Race for the Championship’ on USA; ‘NASCAR America Post-Race Show’ on Peacock ; Upcoming Cup race on USA)
Commercials during race broadcast: ‘Side-by-Side’ (‘Thank you!’ to all of the participating sponsors!)
3:58 PM – 4:01 PM
T-Mobile; Bank of America/customizedcash ; Carvana.com ; Applebee’s; Liberty Mutual; RichmondRaceway.com ; ‘America’s Got Talent’ on NBC
4:31 PM – 4:33 PM
USAA/JoinToday ; Mountain Dew; Advance Auto Parts; Bank of America/customizedcash ; Subway; TheGlen.com ; ‘La Brea’ on NBC
4:43 PM – 4:46 PM
WeatherTech.com ; Liberty Mutual; T-Mobile; Ram Trucks; ‘America’s Got Talent’ on NBC; ‘Password’ on NBC
5:11 PM – 5:14 PM
Carvana.com ; Subway; Propane.com; USAA/JoinToday ; Upcoming Cup race on USA ; Golf on Golf Channel, NBC Sports & Peacock