TV RATINGS: MOTO GP SOARS, SUPERCARS CLIMB
A HUGE audience has tuned in to watch the thrilling finish to the Styrian MotoGP, delivering the two-wheeled circus a monster local audience on Sunday night.
WORDS: Richard Craill
FOR the second week in a row a red flag caused the race to run longer than scheduled, meaning the ratings grew as anticipation built towards another thriller finish.
While 164,000 watched the start of the race – already the largest of the year so far – that number swelled to an enormous 181,000 for the finish, which again pushed into the post-race show.
That figure is 14,000 larger than the audience for last week’s race, also held at the Red Bull ring and also delayed for a heavy crash.
It ensured the MotoGP race topped free-to-air ‘multichannels’ on Sunday.
A further 81,000 (16,000 larger than the previous season-best on Fox) watched on Fox Sports 506, taking the total audience to 262,000 in total – comfortably in the top-20 most watched shows on Australian TV on Sunday.
MotoGP audiences have now increased for the last three straight weeks: The Czech GP drawing 180,000 and Austria’s first race 227,000.
SUPERCARS
FOLLOWING a week of sharing coverage with Channel 10, the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship returned to Fox Sports-only territory for the second round in the Top End in as many weeks.
Numbers for all three races tracked upward from the first Darwin visit, with Race 18 the most-watched Fox Sports race since Adelaide.
Despite starting earlier to the glut of events on in the Territory at the time, Saturday’s Race 16 drew 115,000 to Fox Sports – an improvement over the 106,000 who watched Saturday race on the channel a week prior.
130,000 saw Sunday’s first of two races (112,000 last week) while the best Fox Sports Audience of the year (since racing returned) watched the final race on Sunday afternoon.
That drew 144,000, 18,000 larger than the equivalent race seven days prior. It’s also the largest audience for a race without Channel 10 coverage since Adelaide.
11 of the top-20 STV shows on Sunday were Motorsport, with a notable inclusion being the 81,000 (Race 3) and 69,000 (Race 2) who watched the Top-End categories do battle in the support races.
We can safely say that is the largest audience to watch a Commodore Cup / HQ Holden race this year.
Richard Craill (administrator)
Working full time in the motorsport industry since 2004, Richard has established himself within the group of Australia’s core motorsport broadcasters, covering the support card at the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix for Channel 10, the Bathurst 12 Hour for Channel 7 and Porsche Carrera Cup & Touring Car Masters for FOX Sports’ Supercars coverage. Pretends to be a PR guy / Journalist and sometimes photographer to make ends meet when not yelling at a television in a padded room.
