NASCAR Hits TV Ratings High Hopes While Ryan Newman Gets Trounced

 Last night's Richmond race was the race to watch on TV, as drivers were getting seeded into the 2013 Chase for the Championship.

And the race delivered a pretty suspenseful evening as the laps started to wind down and some were in, some were not, depending on where in the field they were at what point in the closing laps we were in.

Poor Newman.
Ryan Newman got himself into the lead with ten laps to go.  This effectively had him eliminate MWR driver Martin Truex Jr. from the Chase.

But suddenly another MWR driver spun down the front stretch bringing out a caution.  Everyone up front pitted and Newman lost the lead in the pits.

If the race had stayed green, many think Newman would have won it and found himself in the Chase.  But via a fortuitous (or questionable) spin by his teammate, Truex found himself in the hunt to get into the Chase.  And he did, via a points tie-breaker over Newman.

Then there was the restart where Carl Edwards beat the race leader to the line on the restart.  You know that rule where back in June, Jimmie Johnson was black-flagged for "jumping the start" while Montoya bobbled, hung back (I mean never got going) and never let Johnson get back behind him?  Yea, that rule was in neutral last night it seems.

Yea, well, any way, if Edwards was dinged for that move, one wonders if Newman would have still lost to Truex?

Be it as it may, after the race, Newman said that his chances to win the race were eliminated because he did not have a championship contending pit crew.

Sure, Newman was upset at the time.  But one has to wonder if that also wasn't a shot at the team that let him go for lack of funding, then replaced him and added another team to the garage.

Be it as it may, (rumors suggest Newman is headed to RCR, if I heard right the other day), it is what it is.

But what's of interest to me this morning is that the estimation for last night's live programming TV ratings for NASCAR have it prety much tied with FOX's college football broadcast.

The "Daytona 500" TV Ratings Are Through the Roof!

-Danica Patrick has landed NASCAR more numbers yet again.  It's surmised that Patrick's participation and records set (First woman pole-setter, first woman to lead a lap in the Daytona 500, only 1 of 13 to have led laps at both the Daytona 500 and Indy 500) has helped NASCAR have a good time with the TV ratings for this latest, the 2013 D500.

Per MediaLifeMagazine.com the TV ratings for this years Daytona race were 30% higher than last year's race, that was held on a Monday night.  (Due to the weather delay last year.)

But ignoring last year, the ratings were also the highest the race has seen in seven years.

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Note: I'm about to toss out some weird numbers in relation to the ratings.  If you want to know more about these mystery numbers, I have an article on my parent site, TV Ratings Explained.

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This race had the best increase from the previous year, ever. Well, if you count back to 2006 when it first aired on NBC as "ever."  And the ratings climbed as the race drew to a close.  The show averaged a 10.0 household rating, but it climbed to a 12.8 as the race wound down.  And numbers like that are always good for our sport.

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First, I can see that some fans didn't want to deal with the usual "roundy-round" racing, as I've heard it called before, but would rather just dial in to see the end result of the race.  Admittedly, races can get pretty long-winded.  Unlike the Nationwide races, where there's no middle-section for drivers to pace out in.

Second, though Danica Patrick was making waves this year this restrictor plate race, I have to wonder if it was all her?  She was in the race last year, albeit, for a lap, but I don't remember huge ratings for that event.

Third, there's other supposition that the horrible accident that claimed 30 fan injuries the day before at Daytona may have also drawn in the TV viewing crowd.  And I do believe that one, being that what I observe at sports bars week in and week out, the bar crowd gets very focused when something sensational, horrible or eye-catching occurs.

In fact, I was at a bar after the Saturday Nationwide Daytona race finished.  When there was a recap on the TV, no one was really paying attention to the regular information.  But the moment they started replaying the wreck, almost everyone to a tee stood up and drifted over to the TV to watch the replay.

When the news turned to the upcoming 500, they all drifted back to their seats.

So I am thinking, as I've seen, that the potential for wrecks draws in a piece of the ratings pie.  I've asked people point-blank about why they might watch NASCAR, and it's not a pretty answer:  "For the wrecks."

The problem I have is that I hear that more than I'd like.

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But regardless, it's time for the Danica Patrick to get to work.

She's in good equipment and many are expecting good things out of her.

I'm worried because when she raced in the Nationwide series last year and only mustered up a top-10 in points finish and didn't dominate.  Almost any Cup Series driver that participates in the Nationwide races tend to dominate.

Heck, she didn't even dominate when she was testing in the ARCA series.

But here's hoping that her 2013 season soothes the naysayers and she not only makes a name for herself, but for the sport.  Because I can only see big things like more records being broken by Danica Patrick.

Meanwhile, her relationship with Ricky Stenhouse Jr. can't possibly be hurting his media exposure either!!!

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Could NASCAR's Weakness Turn Out To Be the TV Coverage?

I came across a fascinating article over on Frontstretch by Amy Henderson as she touched on how television coverage itself is part of the problem with TV ratings and sponsorships getting hard to find by teams.

I'm first going to recap and touch on her points, then I'm going to head off in my own direction looking at some what's and whys.  And can this be fixed?  Maybe.  Read on.

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Amy makes some great points on the issue where she points out that the special coverage the top-ten teams get from the TV coverage hurts the other thirty teams.

She expounds on how fans she surveyed did note that though they might watch NASCAR, they do note that they may never see their favored driver unless they wreck.

And that's a great point.

Commenters also point out that it's not just TV but most media outside of TV also contribute to the problem.  But more on that later.

Amy correlates the idea that if fans aren't getting to see their drivers, then some may not tune in.  Also, with the mid-level to lesser teams getting no coverage, their sponsors aren't getting the air time they want.  This lack of TV coverage also makes their sponsorship dollars less valuable.  If that's the case, then why would sponsors be motivated to put their stickers on a car's hood or side panels?

And that's a great point that puts the glue in the association between TV coverage and possible sponsor problems for some teams.

The article shows that

"Primary sponsorship of a decent mid-level team is around $15 million for the season."

And that for that $15M to be cost effective, sponsors need to see about four minutes of total coverage.  That's looking at how much a TV ad can cost, per what a sponsor puts in and hopes to get.

And if you wonder how it's calculated, I've seen where teams of people are hired by companies to watch for and time a sponsor's amount of air-time exposure.  It's that important.

And when sponsors don't see their product out there, then what?  What's their bottom line motivations for sponsoring someone who isn't in the favored group of media darlings?  None, to be honest.  And then we start having problems with teams getting those financial backers.

Heck, we've seen winning truck teams take a dive and even good performing mid-level teams close shop.

She then compared how the TV coverage of yesteryear had fans feel like they knew many of the drivers in the field.  How many drivers can you say, you feel like that about today?

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Items Not Addressed in the Article

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With that said, it's a bit more convoluted of a relationship than I've put out here, but this is the gist of the situation.

But how does this get fixed?  And what about that point where all media cater to the top-tier names?

On the point about media catering to the top-tier names, it's another economical equation for print media... the mainstream drivers have a large percentage of fans and that percentage are who buy the print editions.

I am in NO WAY discounting or discrediting the fans of the mid-level or lower ranked teams.  But a print org has to consider, will the 10 fans of Bobby Labonte outweigh the 100 fans of Dale Earnhardt Jr.?

Sadly it's the same kind of economics that go into TV ratings and advertisers backing TV shows.  Ill-rated shows lose sponsors and get cancelled because NOT ENOUGH people are watching.

It's the same form of economics.

Again, with no discredit to folks who are fans of the bottom 25 drivers in the standings.

On the web-based media, it's not so much the economic balance as it is the web traffic.  But web traffic is like money.  And those 10 Bobby Labonte fans versus the 100 Dale Jr. fans tends to get the coveted web traffic.

Hence, the seemingly one-sided amount of coverage.  And yes, myself and many others on the web are guilty of this form of coverage.

(Man, I'm starting to feel guilty as I write this!)

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So Can The TV Coverage be fixed?

Well, sort of.

We first go back to the infamous TV ratings and who is watching a telecast.  Yep, those same 100 fans are weighting the scales here too.  But if you think about those mere four minutes per team to give sponsors their monies worth seems somewhat doable.

There's thirty-six races in a season.  In an optimal piece of coverage, for this example, they're three hours long.  180 minutes.  If all 43 teams got themselves 4 minutes a piece, all by themselves, that adds up to 172 minutes of time.

Though this straight up math doesn't look good, lets' take into account that most camera work doesn't always show single car action, but multiple car coverage.

But let's not forget something... the pre-race coverage and maybe even the web coverage of a race.

When we have a few teams accounting for the majority of the field, those smaller teams definitely have an uphill battle.

And as I crunched the numbers, it wasn't looking good in my optimal example.  But then I thought, hey, the networks have the ticker going by.  Why not picture in a picture, showing the smaller teams and giving them screen time?  Sure, screen real estate is a valuable commodity, but it can be mustered up. 

It's just one suggestion/fix, but the networks need to consider how to give all the teams the exposure they need.

If you think about it, if a sponsor knew they'd get TV time each race, would the start-and-parks start getting sponsors also.  (Hey!  I just realized that as cars drop out of a race, the race to screen time ratio would get slightly easier to deliver that time needed on screen.)

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So therein lies a fascinating issue that touches on the unique relationship between NASCAR, TV, and the media and the fans.  Cover the popular to get the expected demographic numbers and lose some numbers.  But over the long haul, is that best for everyone?

Kudos to Amy's article and I suggest you head on over to Frontstretch and check out what she has to say...  chime in here or over there.

-Bruce

TV Ratings Decline for Phoenix; But Can I Blame Digger?

If you're curious, Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Subway Fresh Fit 500 race earned a 5.0 in the TV ratings.

This is a mixed bit of blessing in that this was the second-highest rating for the Subway Fresh Fit 500 (but that pitch seems weak when you see the chart below) but yet, tied for the lowest rating for the second race of any season, since  Fox started airing NASCAR races.

Sure, there might have been other sporting venues on the tele, but there always are... and we just came off a huge, long, drawn out telecast from last weekend.  There can be all kinds of things that account for the drop, including lack of appreciation of what goes into a race or those that tune in know that the big wrecks happen at the big tracks.  (Sorry to say, but I've seen the generic fan reaction and it's a bit sad.)

Over on Sports Media Watch, they've charted out the ratings for the second race of the NASCAR Sprint Cup season, since 2001.

In 2009 the ratings took a huge dive.

Not to be a hater of the animated critter that was shoved down our throats by Fox, but wasn't 2009 when we started getting fed Digger bites, with the animation and then the next season, with that dreadful cartoon?

I'm sure I'm way off the mark on this one, but the emotional scars are still there and then this chart seems to correlate my own trauma.  Did that many people really get turned off by the Digger marketing or just me?  

Just sayin', in fun of course.

[ sportsmediawatch: ratings from phoenix race ]

'Daytona 500' Telecast Top-10 Bonehead or Funny Observations

The Daytona 500 was a true test of the NASCAR fan, with the telecast having lasted six hours. 

And maybe the first caution that started on lap 2, that took out Jimmie Johnson and Danica Patrick might have been a warning. 

Though rain forced the postponement of the race until Monday, the huge stoppage this night wasn't for rain this time around, but for another incident involving the track.  Last year we watched the track get repaired with bondo after it came apart... all so the boys could get back to racing.  This year, Juan Pablo Montoya (by no fault of his) provided the two hour and five minute stoppage as something in his car broke and that sent his red No. 42 Earnhardt Ganassi Racing Chevy up into the jet dryer trucks that were out blowing debris off the track surface.  This ignited a huge fire and set our next couple of hours on a course of action no one could evade.

But the red flag period, for what it was, actually provided some interesting NASCAR news fodder, after and during the fact.

First up was how the ratings did not suffer from the stoppage... Fox stayed at No. 2 in the ratings race for the night, and that's impressive!  I thought for sure viewers would tune out. 
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TV Ratings for the Daytona 500

Daytona 500 (Fox)
8:00 p.m.: 8.4/13 (#2)
8:30 p.m.: 8.4/12 (#2)
9:00 p.m.: 7.8/11 (#2)
9:30 p.m.: 8.4/12 (#2)
10:00 p.m.: 9.9/15 (#1)
10:30 p.m.: 9.2/15 (#1)

(Ratings via TV Media Insights)

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But what did ensue during the stoppage was interesting.  And if you keep score, I think Daryl Waltrip might have won this round of observations.

1. :  In the lap 2 crash, the in-car footage shows Jimmie Johnson letting go of the steering wheel and crossing his arms while getting hit.  Daryl Waltrip seems to credit Danica Patrick for the drivers adopting this practice.  (Never mind the previous years of experience and that this has been Johnson's practice for quite some time.)
2. : Daryl Waltrip credited Danica Patrick's driving skills for getting through the mess...  except that the car was hit, spun, thumped and slid out of control through a few cars, threading the needle, so to speak.  All, without any intervention from the driver who was along for the ride.
3. :  It's a sad statement of sorts as to your name-driver status, Juan Montoya's impact with the jet dryer truck was not captured on tape.
4. :  During the huge fire of the track dryer truck, while it's still burning brightly, Daryl Waltrip suggests on live TV that someone should get in the truck and drive it off the track to save the track surface.  (Oh look, Daytona has a mid-race entertainment show with a flaming truck screaming past the stands.)
5. :  During the red flag, Fox started showing the ads, side-by-side, with the "action" on the track... of parked cars and drivers walking around.  Then when the race gets going, we're back to regular ads.  Somebody needs to make better judgement calls in the booth.
   
6. :  During the red flag, I stupidly Tweeted that no one was doing the Sterling Marlin.  That means getting out of your car to work on it during a red flag.  Rules state you can't do that.  But then we find out that Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch both were sent to the back of the pack for pulling off their window tear-offs aka dust protectors.  Harsh!
7. : NASCAR Reporter Dustin Long tweeted something I RT'd:  "In the remastered Days of Thunder version, Harry will tell Cole to go out and hit the jet dryer instead of the pace car."
8. :  During the red flag, the cameras closely follow Danica Patrick walk off track and taking the top of her fire suit off...  So the race was turning into a GoDaddy ad or breaking NASCAR news was Danica runs for the potty!
9. :  During the red flag (Man, that red flag created some great events) Brad Keselowksi started tweeting from his inside his car and sent a pciture to Twitter... and gained more than 100,000 new followers.   Brad started the race with just over 80k followers.  Today, as I'm writing this, he now has 207K followers!  Brad even got himself on Mashable for it.
10. : For the Dave Blaney fan:  For 2 hours, Dave Blaney led the Daytona 500 field...  during the red flag.

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NASCAR Ratings - Sept 22-23

Last week, the Busch Series ranked 6th behind a couple of college football games, and the Cup series on Sunday the 23rd, took it to 5th behind a few football games!

See the details at tvweek.com

NHIS Ratings Up on ABC

It is noted that the TV rating was a 3.3 and households were up 7% from last year for the race at New Hampshire.

Scene Daily

Last year's the race was on cable while this year it was on a broadcast station. Maybe that was part of the increase in viewership??

NASCAR Television Ratings

NASCAR's television ratings have continued to decline this year, despite their moving our TV schedules back to merge viewership and help ratings.

Yet, network executives are encouraged by gains in the younger demographics.

Fox reported a 7 % improvement (3.1 rating from 2.9) in the male 18-34 demo on its Cup broadcasts, and ESPN2's coverage of the Busch Series has produced a 2 percent increase (182,827 viewers from 179,446) for that group on cable.

But this is the first year Nielsen is incorporating out-of-home viewing in its numbers, and he thinks viewership from college dormitories accounts for some of the gain. So do the nnumbers really go up, or are we just covering more homes which bolsters the numbers, but not really having an improvement in viewership?

For the rest of the in-depth article, go to SceneDaily

TV Ratings Concerns

Been reading here and there that TV ratings are down or stagnate.

NASCAR took off as they changed their format, but now we're comparing ratings today to the hyper-growth period of growth then. Then again, they are also leaving behind their hard core fans by favoring newer tracks and walking away from the tracks that made it's storied history.

I think the best thing for the ratings, is when drivers go at each other, well, let them.
Whether NASCAR likes the image or not, drama and controversy brings the attention and the money.

Remember Harvick and Biffle at Bristol.
Gordon and Kenseth? (Hmm, at Bristol again)
And Stewart? (Too tracks to note here)
Remember when Jimmy Spencer decked Kurt Busch in his car? I became a Spencer fan, bought a diecast of his, and also bought a Kurt Busch diecast that I promptly tied to the back of my truck and dragged down the street. (Unfortunately, the aero on the damn diecast was pretty good and it stayed wheels down for most of the drive.)

These and many others are continual highlights on various shows openings or what not.
If we let the drivers "police" themselves, there would be less wrecks on the track also, as the newer drivers trying to emulate Earnhardt Sr would use more precaution knowing they were going to "get a lecture" after the race.

Well, it's just a thought off the cuff.