NASCAR: Kurt Busch replacements confirmed for Darlington
By Asher Fair
After Kurt Busch’s second appearance in the Fox Sports booth of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season, some new faces are set to join at Darlington Raceway.
Since the departure of Jeff Gordon after the network’s portion of the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series schedule, Fox has taken a different approach when it comes to their broadcast booth.
Instead of employing three full-time announcers, they have kept the third seat open and called upon various guest analysts to join lead announcer Mike Joy and analyst Clint Bowyer from race to race.
That approach was slightly modified for last year’s throwback race at Darlington Raceway, and it is again set to be modified for this year’s, which is scheduled to take place this coming Mother’s Day Sunday afternoon.
Last year’s race saw seven-time champion Richard Petty join the full-time duo for stage one, 2000 champion Bobby Labonte join for stage two, and 1988 champion Bill Elliott join for stage three.
This year’s race is set to see Richard Petty and son Kyle Petty join for stage one, with Carl Edwards and Elliott set to join for stages two and three.
Eight different individuals have gotten the chance to be guest analysts so far this NASCAR Cup Series season.
Kurt Busch is the most recent. Busch has made two booth appearances this year, first at Circuit of the Americas in late March and then again this past Sunday at Kansas Speedway, where he won a year ago.
Tony Stewart leads everybody with six appearances this season and is set to make a seventh at Charlotte Motor Speedway in under three weeks for the longest race on the schedule, the Coca-Cola 600.
Fox is set to go back to having three full-time announcers beginning next year, once Kevin Harvick retires from driving. He is set to join Joy and Bowyer in the booth on a weekly basis.
Fox’s portion of this year’s broadcast schedule, which also includes a select number of races on Fox Sports 1, is set to run through the race at Sonoma Raceway on Sunday, June 11.
Following the season’s lone off weekend on Father’s Day weekend, NBC and USA are set to take over for the remaining 10 regular season races and all 10 playoff races.
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Tune in to Fox Sports 1 at 3:00 p.m. ET this coming Sunday, May 14 for the live broadcast of the Goodyear 400 from Darlington Raceway. Start a free trial of FuboTV today if you have not already had the chance to do so!