Atlanta NASCAR TV Rating

UPDATE The final rating for last Sunday's Sprint Cup race in Atlanta was a 3.6/8 share, down 10% from last year's 4.0 final rating, also on ABC.

The grandstands in Atlanta looked like a Nationwide or Truck race

10/27/08 The overnight TV rating for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Pep Boys Auto 500 from Atlanta Sunday on ABC was a 3.2, down 9% from last year's 3.5 overnight rating, also on ABC. The prior year the overnight was 4.3 on NBC, so the alarming rating drop for NASCAR continues. That combined with the horrible attendance Sunday and it's not hard to imagine that Atlanta will have only one Cup race starting in 2010. One might say the economy is keeping people away at the race track but that does not explain why people are tuning out on TV as well where the cost to them is zero.