By alley - Jul 8, 2015, 1:22 PM ET

UPDATED Ratings: Rain cuts into NASCAR's NBC debut

Rain delays at Daytona's Coke Zero 400 limited the audience potential for NASCAR Sprint Cup racing's return to NBC on Sunday night (and Monday morning) long before

the spectacularly terrifying end to the race

made for a video clip must-see (2.5m views and counting on NASCAR's official recap video, at the end of the article linked above). The race drew a 2.6 overnight rating on NBC according to ShowBuzzDaily, which SportsMedia Watch says marks an 8% uptick from last year's overnight when the event aired on TNT and was postponed a full day due to rain.

The debut of the NASCAR Xfinity Series on NBCSN scored a 0.98 on Saturday, averaging 1.6 million viewers according to SportsTV.com.

Eliminations for the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series from Norwalk, Ohio again drew a solid audience for its live show Sunday afternoon on ESPN, attracting an average of 678,000 viewers.

Formula 1, pushed off to CNBC due to NBCSN's commitment to the Tour de France, managed a 0.26 overnight rating for the live telecast of the British Grand Prix. However, the replay of the race on NBCSN later in the day did considerably better, averaging 493,000 viewers. Delayed coverage of the GP2 Series from Silverstone which followed the British GP replay averaged 156,000 viewers.