NASCAR TNT viewership revealed for AutoTrader EchoPark Automotive 400 at Dover

Sunday’s AutoTrader EchoPark Automotive 400 at Dover Motor Speedway got 2.009 million viewers on TNT, per Adam Stern of Sports Business Journal. Viewership dropped 27% during the near hour-long rain delay in Stage 3.

Overall viewership was down from last year’s race at Dover, which got 2.401 million viewers on FS1. Other than the rain delayed Saturday night race at EchoPark Speedway in Atlanta — which had 1.608 million viewers — this was the least-watched race of the inaugural NASCAR In-Season Tournament.

Denny Hamlin took the checkered flag last April and did so again Sunday. Hamlin led 67 laps at Dover, fending off Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Chase Briscoe to win his Cup Series leading fourth race of the season.

“Winning here in Dover is super special to me,” Hamlin said after the race, via NBC Sports. “This is a place I’ve not been very good at the first half of my career. Having a back-to-back here over the last few years is amazing. [On how he improved at Dover] I just studied some of the greats here. I was very fortunate to have Martin Truex as a teammate. Jimmie Johnson, watching him win 10 times here. You learn from the greats, and you change your game to match it, you have success like this.”

Denny Hamlin takes the win at Dover after Chase Elliott strategy backfires

Hamlin picked up career win No. 58. But for much of the afternoon, it was Chase Elliott who had the best car. Starting from the pole, Elliott led a race-high 238 laps.

But in Stage 3, Elliott and his team made a strategy call that backfired. Elliott, one of six cars on the lead lap, came down pit road for two tires during the Lap 340 caution for rain. Elliott had pitted just seven laps earlier. Hamlin and the No. 11 team decided to stay out on older tires, and that strategy was the winning one. Elliott, meanwhile, finished a disappointing sixth.

The team waffled on the call before crew chief Alan Gustafson made the final decision to bring Elliott to pit road. Gustafson told The Athletic after the race that he regretted the call to pit in general.

“Obviously, didn’t work out,” Gustafson said. “Certainly, concerned about being first and being the only guy with no tires, and then wanting to have the best tires and the best-positioned left-side tires. I’d like the [call] back, obviously.”