MRN was established in 1970 as an enterprise of Bill France Sr., who had founded NASCAR itself two decades earlier. Ken Squier, a respected broadcaster who would later anchor CBS Sports' Daytona 500 coverage from 1979 to 1997, co-founded the network. The flagship station is WNDB, serving Daytona Beach, Florida. In 2008, the network's headquarters relocated to the Charlotte, North Carolina area, reflecting NASCAR's own administrative center of gravity.
MRN is one of the two principal radio broadcasters of the NASCAR Cup Series, covering events held at NASCAR-owned tracks as well as Pocono Raceway and Gateway Motorsports Park, and also carries the NASCAR All-Star Race. The complementary network, Performance Racing Network (PRN), owned by Speedway Motorsports, handles the majority of remaining Cup and Xfinity races. Many stations hold affiliations with both MRN and PRN to air a complete NASCAR schedule. As of 2025, MRN and PRN collaborate under the banner of the NASCAR Racing Network to carry all NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series events, with MRN handling distribution. All races are simultaneously available on Sirius XM NASCAR Radio.
Beyond NASCAR, MRN broadcasts the majority of the ARCA Menards Series. The network previously held exclusive radio rights to the United SportsCar Championship (now covered by IMSA) and to Formula One events in the United States, including the United States Grand Prix, which returned to the calendar in 2012 at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.
While race broadcasts are its primary output, MRN produces a range of daily and weekly radio programs and podcasts carried by select affiliates and distributed online. These include NASCAR Today, a twice-daily news report; MRN Outloud!, a review of the past weekend's racing action; American Racing Snobs, a program focused on Formula 1 and other international disciplines; and Busch Pole Updates, short qualifying reports during Cup Series weekends. Other podcasts cover topics from NHRA to winged sprint car racing. Three MRN announcers co-host daily call-in programs on Sirius XM NASCAR Radio throughout the year.
The network's current lead booth announcer is Alex Hayden, who has held the role since 2019. Mike Bagley joined the booth in 2025 and co-hosts The Morning Drive on Sirius XM. Rusty Wallace, the former NASCAR champion, has been a booth announcer since 2015. Dave Moody is the network's longest-serving turn announcer, active since 1987 and lead turn announcer since 2001; he also hosts Sirius XM Speedway. Steve Post serves as lead pit reporter.
Among the prominent alumni who passed through MRN before moving to television are Mike Joy, who was a turn announcer and co-anchor between 1976 and 1987 and went on to become the lead announcer for Fox Sports' NASCAR coverage from 2001; Allen Bestwick, who later anchored NASCAR coverage on ABC and ESPN; Jerry Punch, who became the lead pit reporter for ESPN and ABC; and Adam Alexander, now the lead broadcaster for the NASCAR Cup Series on Amazon Prime and TNT. Barney Hall, one of the defining voices of MRN, served as a booth announcer for 44 years before retiring in 2014; he died in 2016.
MRN maintains approximately 600 affiliate stations across the United States, covering major markets including Charlotte, Dallas, Detroit, Miami, Kansas City, and Richmond, alongside smaller regional stations in racing heartlands across the Southeast and Midwest.
Gallery · 2 related images
