TV News: USA Network TV Ratings (Update)

Some additional notes of the F1 TV Rating from Baku:

Avg. audience of 832K – second most-viewed since race began in ’16 (down from last year’s 970K average – last year’s race started an hour later)

Only second race of 2022 season to average less than 1 million viewers

Audience peaked at 980K in 7:30-7:45am ET

Through 8 races, #F1 averaging 1.3 million viewers, up 39 pc over first 8 races of 2021 (946K)

The top-10 local markets for Sunday’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix on ESPN were:

1. Nashville – 0.9
2. New York – 0.6
3. Austin – 0.6
4. Memphis – 0.6
5. Indianapolis – 0.5
6. Charlotte – 0.5
7. Raleigh-Durham – 0.5
8. Hartford – 0.5
9. Philadelphia – 0.5
10. W. Palm Beach – 0.4

Rating Analysis

• The NASCAR Cup race TV Rating from Sonoma was a 1.30, down 12.75% from last year’s 1.49 also on FS1
• The IndyCar race TV Rating from Road America was a 0.69 on NBC, up 46.81% from last year’s 0.47 on NBCSN, so of course this year’s rating was higher.  The rating was down 4.1% vs. the last time the race (0.72 rating) was on NBC in 2020 and down 10.3% from the 0.77 NBC rating in 2019.
• The IndyCar race had the worst ratio of 18-49 year-old viewers to total viewers at 19% indicating that the IndyCar fan base is aging out faster than the others. With less than 20% of viewers in the age range sponsors and advertisers want to see, this does not bode well for IndyCar in terms of revenue growth from sponsors and advertisers. This is a major area IndyCar needs to improve on.  The ratio is consistently lowest vs. F1 and NASCAR Cup.
• The F1 TV Rating from Baku, Azerbaijan was a 0.48 on ESPN, down 21.31% from a 0.61 rating in 2021. This is the first F1 race experiencing a drop so far this year vs. last year.
• The F1 race had by far the youngest fan base tuned in, with 46% in the all-important 18-49 year-old age bracket, the one sponsors and advertisers care about most. Can F1 hit a remarkable 50% before the year is out? Time will tell.

Weekend TV Ratings

*Race on NBCSN in 2021, NBC in 2022