Mark Pougatch emerges as contender for BBC F1 presenter position

The article in The Times today by Kevin Eason contains a lot of information and details which I shall cover in a blog post probably tomorrow as to the validity of those details. One thing I do spot though is that in the bullet points alongside the article is that Mark Pougatch is noted as a contender for the BBC F1 presenter role to replace Jake Humphrey.

It is the first time I have seen Pougatch linked to the role, so I thought it was worth creating a blog as I have not previously mentioned him. Pougatch, as the article mentions is an experienced broadcaster and veteran, having presented several sports strands including 5 Live Sport on the radio, Football Focus and ITV4’s coverage of the African Cup of Nations.

The article also notes Lee McKenzie as expected, as well as Chris Evans, although the latter appeared to pull out of the running last weekend. In any case, Pougatch appears to be a serious contender to replace Humphrey.

The Twitter outlook

This weekend Formula 1 returns to North America for the United States Grand Prix to be held in Austin, Texas. But for the moment, here is the weekly Twitter update.

Drivers – The Top 10
01 – 1,245,171 – Fernando Alonso (Ferrari)
02 – 1,233,729 – Jenson Button (McLaren)
03 – 1,205,496 – Lewis Hamilton (McLaren)
04 – 517,940 – Bruno Senna (Williams)
05 – 481,473 – Mark Webber (Red Bull)
06 – 336,550 – Sergio Perez (Sauber)
07 – 296,732 – Pastor Maldonaldo (Williams)
08 – 216,984 – Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)
09 – 205,715 – Felipe Massa (Ferrari)
10 – 194,531 – Pedro de la Rosa (HRT)

Drivers – Biggest Increases
01 – 17,104 – Fernando Alonso
02 – 15,706 – Lewis Hamilton
03 – 10,511 – Jenson Button
04 – 4,668 – Mark Webber
05 – 4,463 – Sergio Perez

Drivers – Smallest Increases
01 – 439 – Charles Pic
02 – 498 – Timo Glock
03 – 575 – Jean-Eric Vergne
04 – 728 – Daniel Ricciardo
05 – 965 – Vitaly Petrov

All fairly status quo in the drivers’ table as Alonso, Hamilton and Button continue to pull away from the other drivers’ at a significant rate.

Teams – The Top 10
01 – 371,084 – Ferrari
02 – 257,501 – McLaren
03 – 185,459 – Red Bull
04 – 162,705 – Mercedes
05 – 154,826 – Lotus
06 – 91,857 – Caterham
07 – 89,458 – Marussia
08 – 89,058 – Force India
09 – 88,669 – Sauber
10 – 79,477 – Williams

Teams – Biggest Increases
01 – 3,460 – Ferrari
02 – 3,391 – Red Bull
03 – 2,772 – Lotus

Teams – Smallest Increases
01 – 301 – Williams
02 – 490 – Caterham
03 – 650 – Toro Rosso

Kimi Raikkonen’s win for Lotus at Abu Dhabi keeps them in the top three, whilst Williams record the lowest increase of the week.

Driver and Team statistics as of Monday 12th November 2012.

Sky Sports F1 – Top 10 ratings (week ending 4th November, 2012)

From BARB:

1 – 541k – Live Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (Sunday, 11:30)
2 – 315k – Live Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Qualifying (Saturday, 12:00)
3 – 117k – Live Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Practice 3 (Saturday, 09:45)
4 – 88k – Live Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Practice 1 (Friday, 08:45)
5 – 76k – Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Qualifying Replay (Saturday, 15:45)
6 – 67k – Live Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Practice 2 (Friday, 12:45)
7 – 66k – Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Qualifying Replay (Sunday, 08:45)
8 – 46k – Britain’s Next F1 Star (Sunday, 16:17)
9 – 45k – Inside Track: Sebastian Vettel (Saturday, 11:45)
10 – 40k – Legends (Saturday, 11:15)

A good set of ratings here considering it was a BBC live weekend. The live race day programmes compares favourably to other rounds where BBC are also live:

– Spain: 523k
– Monaco: 565k
– Europe: 531k
– Singapore: 475k

Furthermore, Britain’s Next F1 Star makes its first appearance in the top 10, interestingly for its Sunday repeat and not the Thursday première airing, which shows that the Sunday post-race slot is more attractive than a stable Thursday slot at 19:30 as the Formula 1 audience is already there.

The Inside Track show with Sebastian Vettel was an extended interview he did with Ted Kravitz recorded during the Indian Grand Prix weekend. Like above, this wasn’t a première airing, although it was worth a watch as it was the raw version rather than a trimmed down version. It was nice seeing Vettel mess around a bit in the extended version, which did not make the cut down version. Of course, only those that were lucky enough to spot the late addition to the schedule were able to watch it.

No F1 Show in the top ten either, I do wonder whether they will change the Friday scheduling of that next year because the editions on race weekend seem to vary wildly ratings wise.

F1 2012 DVD season review to be released in 2013

Bad news for those including myself who were hoping for the 2012 Formula One season review DVD/Blu-Ray to be released before Christmas. Amazon.co.uk have a release date currently of January 7th, 2013, two weeks after Christmas.

Considering the 2011 season review was released on December 26th last year, I’m slightly confused as to why the 2012 date has been pushed back into 2013. Going by last year’s date, I was anticipating a release of Christmas Eve this year, but it appears that won’t happen. The late date may be due to a change of distributors, last year was released by Universal Pictures UK, whereas this year according to Amazon is being distributed by Metrodome Group.

I don’t know how well the DVD sales are worldwide, but I imagine it will sell a lot less than normal with the release date after Christmas.

The DVD as usual will be voiced by Will Buxton and Ben Edwards. Luckily, if you prefer your season reviews in book form, then AUTOCOURSE comes out on December 1st, whilst The Official Formula 1 Season Review is released on December 13th.

Update on January 4th – Bad news for those wanting the Blu-Ray copy, it has been pushed back to January 14th according to Amazon.

200 and upwards

On Thursday, The F1 Broadcasting Blog passed 200 posts, which is for me a fantastic achievement. Arguably the latter one hundred is more difficult than the first hundred because you risk regurgitating yourself which is something I have tried not to do so far, although that in itself can be difficult!

In any case, I am thankful for those that are continuing to read, as of writing the blog has recorded over 34,000 views, which has simply staggered me – it seems strange writing that when back in July at post 100 it was just over 5,000 views. Okay, it may not be as high as some Formula 1 sites out there, but to my knowledge there is not another Formula 1 and motor sport broadcasting site out there, so it is in many different ways unknown territory.

It has, for the most part though been successful, I still enjoy writing about it which is the main thing alongside juggling my University commitments. Inevitably though, there will always be room for improvement, whether it is what the blog covers, or, to be more succinct, what the blog does not cover that it probably should or could. Whether I spread my wings in terms of content in 2013, time will tell depending on what happens with other commitments and time.

As I did back in July, for those just starting to read, I shall link below to the ten posts that have received the most views since I started the blog:

– 10. The BBC F1 Team: The Verdict so Far, August 16th
– 9. Predicting the 2013 calendar pick order, September 21st*
– 8. Ecclestone suggests the end is near for BBC F1… or is it?, June 7th [8th when I reached 100 posts]
– 7. McLaren launch animation unit with new animation series ‘Tooned’ on Sky Sports F1, July 6th [2nd when I reached 100 posts]
– 6. The Sky Sports F1 Team: The Verdict so Far, August 14th
– 5. Live Blog: The 2012 Singapore Grand Prix Qualifying session, September 22nd
– 4. Eddie Jordan’s credibility, September 5th
– 3. Tom Clarkson doing Lee McKenzie’s job this weekend, June 9th [1st when I reached 100 posts]
– 2. A few thoughts on Jake Humphrey leaving the BBC, September 18th
– 1. Italian Grand Prix records highest rating since 1998, September 10th**

* may still be modified depending on calendar changes
** thanks to this share by Jake Humphrey

I’ll end this post by saying thank you to everyone who has read the site so far, and I hope you enjoy the site more as we head towards and into 2013.

Cheers,
Dave
Owner of The F1 Broadcasting Blog