NASCAR All-Star Race TV Ratings (Update)

UPDATE FS1's broadcast of the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race on Saturday averaged 3.5 million viewers from 8:40-11:21pm ET. In previous years, Speed carried the All-Star Race and the Sprint Showdown on the same night; this year FS1 split the two, carrying the All-Star Race on Saturday and the Sprint Showdown on Friday. In past years, Speed produced the All-Star Race and Showdown as one 4-hour program. The All Star Race is the second most-watched telecast in FS1's 9-month history.

05/20/14 Overnight ratings dropped by double-digits for the first NASCAR All-Star Race since Speed Channel became Fox Sports 1. The NASCAR Sprint Cup All-Star Race earned a 1.7 overnight rating on Fox Sports 1 Saturday night, according to ShowBuzz Daily, down 15% from last year on Speed Channel (2.0). Speed Channel, of course, became Fox Sports 1 last August. Keep in mind Speed Channel was in 86.0 million viewers at the time of last year's race, just shy of the most recent available tally for Fox Sports 1 (86.7M in March). Saturday's 1.7 overnight is just shy of FS1's first NASCAR telecast of the season, the Sprint Unlimited on February 15 (1.8). That race aired opposite the Winter Olympics. Despite the lower numbers, NASCAR was still a much bigger draw for FS1 than its other programming. The network earned a mere 0.3 overnight for the Pirates/Yankees Major League Baseball game earlier in the day but racing in the USA will continue its march into oblivion until go-kart racing becomes a sport in every high school and college in the USA. Until that happens, today's youth has very little interest in racing. Most are not exposed to it and the average age of the race fan is getting dangerously high.