Saturday afternoon brought the Xfinity Series to Darlington Raceway for 200 miles of action under the hot sun.  Denny Hamlin was looked at as the favorite to execute a butt-kicking on the field.  However, that did not come to pass.

Coverage-wise, the biggest story here was the introduction of Ricky Carmichael to the broadcast.  It seemed really random to have him there knowing that the Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship was decided that very day at Fox Raceway in Pala, Calif.

Unlike a number of guest analysts that have appeared on NASCAR broadcasts over the past few years, Carmichael brings a lot of TV experience.  For the past few years, he has served as a booth analysis for Monster Energy AMA Supercross broadcasts, first with FOX Sports 1 and now with NBC Sports.

Also, Carmichael does have NASCAR experience.  It's been a while, though.  He raced full-time in the Camping World Truck Series for Turner Motorsports and also made eight starts in what was then the Nationwide Series.  Prior to one of those starts at Daytona in 2011, I got to interview Carmichael.

Admittedly, what I remember best from this interview was just how hot and humid it was during it.  By the time I finished it, I was getting dizzy from the 82 degree weather with a dewpoint of 78.  In the interview, Carmichael discussed his progression in NASCAR, which was ahead of schedule at the time, and his continued ties to motocross and supercross.

Little did we know that Carmichael's time in NASCAR was not long for this world after that.  He was supposed to be the second driver in the Kyle Busch Motorsports No. 54 in 2012.  Then, Kurt Busch got fired from Team Penske.  The team kept the Monster Energy funding that Carmichael brought to the team and put Kurt Busch in the car for those races, effectively ending his time in NASCAR.

After that scenario, Carmichael had not sat in a race car after 2011 until Saturday morning when he took the NBC car out onto the track.  Footage of that was aired Sunday prior to the Cup race.  Despite driving around at a relatively low speed, Carmichael relayed information about the transition from the existing pavement to the patch that actually played a fairly substantial role in the broadcast.  It was a little surprising coming from someone that had been away from the sport for as long as Carmichael has, but welcomed.

Saturday's 200-mile Xfinity Series race was an excellent race to watch.  There was a good amount of racing to go around.  Yes, Hamlin was quick, but he was snakebitten, first by the early spin while trying to lap Carson Ware, then the penalty on the final stop.

Probably the one thing that I didn't like about the broadcast was the mess on the lap 144 restart.  Daniel Hemric spun out on his own on worn tires to cause the yellow.  That was covered well, including the car shedding debris that caused the GWC.

Prior to the yellow coming out, AJ Allmendinger smacked the wall in turn 3, I guess.  There was no footage of that on the broadcast despite Allmendinger running second at the time.  I can assume what happened, but the viewers need to know for sure.  Remember that this crash nearly cost Allmendinger the points lead.

Watching this broadcast in the dead of night, it seemed to me like NBCSN spent a good amount of time on the patch and how it affected the action during the broadcast.  They should have.  Problem is, it seems like they assumed that everyone watched the Xfinity race Saturday during the Cup race, which is clearly not the case.  That's why I was left wondering about that in Tuesday's Couch Potato Tuesday column.

Same thing with the tires.  You saw some pretty nasty looking tires during the Xfinity broadcast, but next to nothing during the Cup race.  Justin Allgaier ran his tires down to basically nothing on his first run.  It makes sense why he dropped back.

This race had eight cautions.  As a result, it ran long by nearly a half-hour.  NBCSN built this in with a post-race show, but the checkered flag came out roughly 28 minutes into that post-race show.  As a result, viewers only got a brief interview with Noah Gragson before leaving Darlington for horse racing.

Overall, this was a good broadcast.  Carmichael actually has more TV experience than Dale Earnhardt Jr. does, so he fit in right away.  That said, his motorcycle background did lead to some unusual statements, like the time where he stated that he would have rather had been in Tommy Joe Martins' boat Saturday had both him and Riley Herbst been on motorcycles.  This flabbergasted the rest of the booth.

Phil Allaway is the Newsletter Manager for Frontstretch.  He can be reached via e-mail at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com.  Photo is courtesy of Nigel Kinrade Photography.