IRL ratings for season opener

T

The_Mad_Hatter

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Not a huge increase in the tv ratings but more people are definitely watching.

From motorsportstv.com:

IRL Opener Nets 1.8 Rating
The IRL opener on ABC netted a 1.8 rating and 4 share in the overnights. This is an impressive showing over last year, with the 2002 opener on ABC on the same weekend finishing with a 1.5 final rating. (3/4)
 
From Neilsen: "There are an estimated 105.5 million television households in the USA. A single ratings point represents 1%, or 1,055,000 households for the 2001-02 season. Share is the percentage of television sets in use tuned to a specific program."


So, a 1.8 rating would translate to almost 2 million people. Actually, when the smaller markets are factored in the total viewing audience should be 2 million people.

The share is the amount of people watching tv at that time who are watching a certain program. So a 4 share on Sunday afternoon ain't terrible, but its not awesome either.
 
For another perspective, the CART opener on SPEED brought a .2 rating - or about 136,000 viewers.

So essentially, IRL is burying CART in viewership.

The Las Vegas Winston Cup race brought a 6.3 rating and 13 share.
 
Originally posted by The_Mad_Hatter@Mar 4 2003, 04:03 PM
For another perspective, the CART opener on SPEED brought a .2 rating - or  about 136,000 viewers.

So essentially, IRL is burying CART in viewership.

The Las Vegas Winston Cup race brought a 6.3 rating and 13 share.
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OUCH!!!!
 
For another perspective, check out the numbers for the Nascar Craftsman Truck Series.

From motorsportstv.com:

The debut of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series on SPEED Channel was a ratings success. SPEED’s 1.03 household rating (576,000 HH) for the Florida Dodge Dealers 250 on Feb. 14 was the highest Daytona rating received by the NASCAR Craftsman Trucks since the series first ran at the famed speedway in 2000.

According to Nielsen Media Research, SPEED Channel’s 1.03 rating was a 75 percent increase over last year’s Daytona season opener on ESPN (.6) and generated 14 percent more household impressions (576,000 to 507,000) and 42 percent more total viewers (870,000 to 612,000). The quarter-hour high for the SPEED broadcast (1:15 – 1:30 p.m.) was a 1.21 with more than one million total viewers.
 
It seems that being on Speed generally hurts the numbers CART rings up. Last season the ratings when CART was on CBS were substantially higher than when they were on Speed.

Lowest ratings on CBS were around .8 to .9 with 875,000 households and a couple of times, Milwaukee was one I know, they actually got over the 1.0 mark.

But if I recall the story correctly, I think CART was for intents and purposes paying CBS to air the races.

The IRL rating of 1.8 translates to 1,908,000 Households and that's not too bad. A little promo work by the network and some good racing may get that rating up.
 
HS, I know a lot of people in the CART camp use the fact that their races are broadcast on SPEED as a reason for their low tv ratings. But I think it all comes down to promotion and what you put on the track. IMO, CART isn't doing a very good job at either right now.

That's why I threw in that Truck Series info. The Truck Series has always had exciting racing, but ESPN wouldn't promote them. Then they tape delayed the races and just ended the broadcast as soon as the winner took the checkered flag. I think a series can survive on the SPEED Channel with the right marketing campaign.

:cheers:
 
Agree that CART is way behind the curve in both promotion and product. And viewership lags for the same reasons. The one promo I recall from last season with various drivers being shown in very fast clips talking about being fast, needing only a track or something to that effect? Anyways, except for a couple of them, most of the time found myself going "Who was that?" Something like that works once you have the audience going, but won't get new folks to the sport.

I would imagine that the reason for the CBS ratings being higher is that the casual viewer is more aware fo what hits "broadcast" channels and the surfers who find it by accident.
 
i dont know anything about tv ratings besides the little lesson that mad hatter gave me just now. But i would have to attribute the low SPEED ratings because not all cable providers give them speed channel so not everyone that has CBS gets speed. If you wouldnt mind Hatter, could you find some F1 ratings, say from last year's opener, this years opener and the next race in malaysia?
 
Originally posted by BebiF1@Mar 12 2003, 11:30 AM
i dont know anything about tv ratings besides the little lesson that mad hatter gave me just now. But i would have to attribute the low SPEED ratings because not all cable providers give them speed channel so not everyone that has CBS gets speed. If you wouldnt mind Hatter, could you find some F1 ratings, say from last year's opener, this years opener and the next race in malaysia?
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I'll try to do that BebiF1.
 
Here's some info on the F1 ratings. And I get all these from www.motorsportstv.com too if you wanna keep up to date.

SPEED Aussie F1 Ratings In
The results are in for the first broadcasts of this year's Formula One racing on Speed Channel. The race did a very respectable .54 rating on Saturday night, drawing 307,000 households.
 
Thursday night's qualifying sessions had a .27 rating with 154,000 households. This is 10,000 more than the dirt race lead in, which did a .25 with 144,000 households. Friday night's session garnered a .31 rating, with 174,000 households.
 
So actually, tape-delayed UDTRA races brought in more viewers than the live CART season-opener. I'll go out on a limb and say CART is in deep, very deep.
 
If ya check out the CART section here you will find that CART and Road America may hve reached the end of their relationship for a while.

Just as measuring stick I intruded on Hatter's research and found these numbers for 2002 F1 telecasts.

The first two F1 races last year, both on Speed, averaged a .29 rating or 145,000 HH. I could not find individual ratings for the two races. Viewership picked up for Speed's broadcast from Brazil which drew a .67 or 334,000 HH. It should be noted here that ABC's first F1 broadcast last season from Monaco drew a 2.0 or 2,101,000 HH but that by the time ABC did their lst race of the season the number was to about a third of that at 0.7 or 736,000.
 
WOW! Didn't realize the F1 ratings dropped that much last year. No wonder they're trying to re-write the rules LOL!
 
Originally posted by The_Mad_Hatter@Mar 12 2003, 12:30 PM
WOW! Didn't realize the F1 ratings dropped that much last year. No wonder they're trying to re-write the rules LOL!
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Seems even worse when ya figure that that was the Indy event. One would think that folks here would tend to watch a race on their own turf.

And it wasn't just here, ratings in Europe and around the world were experiencing drastic fall-offs.
 
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