TV News: Weekend USA Motorsports TV Ratings
TV Ratings for last weekend’s major USA motorsports events – NASCAR in Texas, NHRA at zMax, F1 at Suzuka and MotoGP in India
TV Rating Analysis
NASCAR
The USA Network drew 2.00 million viewers for the NASCAR Cup playoff race at Texas Motor Speedway Sunday afternoon, up 4.82% from 1.908 million in 2022, also on the USA Network, though the 2022 edition had a rain delay in the middle of it.
The Saturday afternoon Xfinity race at TMS drew 828,000 viewers on the USA Network, down 3.94% from 2022.
Only 15% of the viewers were in the all-important 18-49 year old age group for the Cup race, a horrible result.
NHRA
The Carolina Nationals from zMAX on FS1 drew only 235,000 viewers, down 84% from last year on FOX. Only 11% of the viewers were in the all-important 18-49 year old age group.
Formula 1
Contrary to NASCAR’s horrible 15% result, the F1 Japanese GP on ESPN2 had 53% of the viewers in the all-important 18-49 year old age group…..the best in all motorsports by a wide margin.
Considering the overnight hours (1:00am start time), The Japanese GP on ESPN2 drew an average audience of 479K viewers, down 12.75% from last year on ESPN2.
Despite being on Cable TV starting at 1:00am, the F1 race still drew more viewers than the MotoGP race on NBC and the NHRA finals on FS1 in the afternoon.
TV Ratings Data
| Network | Event | Location | Total Viewers |
18-49 Viewers |
Ratio: 18-49 Yr Old/ Total Viewers |
2023 Rating |
2022 Rating |
Rating % Chg. |
2022 Network |
2022 Viewers |
2022 18-49 Viewers |
Total Viewers % Chg |
18-49 Viewers % Chg |
| USA | NASCAR Cup race | Texas | 2,000,000 | 291,000 | 15% | 1.20 | 1.11 | 8.11% | USA | 1,908,000 | 344,000 | 4.82% | -15.41% |
| USA | NASCAR Xfinity race | Texas | 828,000 | 112,000 | 14% | 0.48 | 0.52 | -7.69% | USA | 862,000 | 158,000 | -3.94% | -29.11% |
| ESPN2 | F1 Japanese GP | Suzuka | 479,000 | 254,000 | 53% | 0.23 | 0.28 | -17.86% | ESPN2 | 549,000 | 364,000 | -12.75% | -30.22% |
| NBC | MotoGP | India | 238,000 | 42,000 | 18% | 0.17 | No race in 2022 – No data | ||||||
| FS1 | NHRA Finals | Charlotte | 235,000 | 27,000 | 11% | 0.14 | 0.80 | -82.50% | FOX | 1,452,000 | 405,000 | -83.82% | -93.33% |