- Nascar hits 4.03m viewers for Phoenix race, a 19% YoY increase
- F1 audience falls 40% for Saudi Arabian GP compared to 2023
- IndyCar season makes lukewarm debut with 18% fall in viewership
Nascar has recorded promising viewership figures in the US to start 2024 as IndyCar and Formula One showed signs of a downturn.
Last weekend, the race at Phoenix Raceway saw Nascar’s largest year-over-year (YoY) increase in viewership so far this year. 4.03 million viewers tuned in to watch Christopher Bell take his first win of the season, a 19 per cent increase on 2023.
Broadcast on Fox, this is the third straight Nascar race to show a percentage increase compared to last season. This also means that the series has hit over four million viewers in four of its first five races, a figure it only reached four times in the whole of last season.
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Conversely, Formula One has seen viewership plummet for the start of its season. Last weekend’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix fell 40 per cent YoY to just 920,000 viewers. However, this year’s race was broadcast on ESPN2 as opposed to the main ESPN channel in 2023.
This race at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit was also held on a Saturday this year instead of its usual Sunday slot, which may have had a knock-on effect with viewership.
That said, the first race of the Formula One season in Bahrain was also held on a Saturday and drew in 1.12 million viewers, the third-largest audience for a Bahrain Grand Prix. This race was aired on the main ESPN channel, but still fell 14 per cent YoY.
IndyCar has also got off to a slow start in 2024. The series’ opening race of the season in St Petersburg, Florida garnered an audience of 975,000, an 18 per cent decrease compared to 2023.
The race competed for eyeballs with the Big 10 Women’s Basketball Tournament final, featuring highly-touted prospect Caitlin Clark, which could offer an explanation for the decrease.
BlackBook says...
Is the sports docuseries format dead in the water? The evidence suggests not.
Nascar spent around US$5 million on the Full Speed docuseries, its first true attempt to replicate the Drive to Survive approach that has served Formula One so well.
The resulting viewership figures are promising. The Busch Light Clash and the Daytona 500 may have struggled – recording 59 per cent and 27 per cent audience decreases, respectively – but these events suffered from scheduling reshuffles due to severe weather.
It will be interesting to see if this momentum can be maintained once Nascar races shift off the main Fox channel. After Richmond Raceway hosts the series on 31st March, seven out of ten races will be shown on FS1 instead of Fox.
As for Formula One and IndyCar, it is too early to jump to conclusions on viewership trends. The former, though, will certainly be worried that the on-track predictability is in danger of permanently damaging the image of the series in the US.
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