Sky’s fortunes increase as BBC’s Australian Grand Prix ratings drop

The Australian Grand Prix weekend saw a change in fortunes for both BBC and Sky Sports. In a stark contrast to last year’s viewing figures, Sky Sports F1 recorded an increase for both Qualifying and the Race, but BBC dropped year-on-year.

Race
A quick note to start with. I’ll be using the Sky ‘race show’ slot to compare with previous years for the entire season, but will use the exact timeslot in the previous years data to do comparisons. Do not expect me to compare a full programme average (in 2012 or 2013) with a ‘race show’ average for 2014, because such a comparison would be invalid.

BBC’s highlights programme on BBC One on Sunday afternoon averaged 2.88m (25.4%), unofficial overnight viewing figures show. This figure is up on 2012 which averaged 2.73m, however, is down on the 3.05m that the programme averaged last season. Its not a major drop, but a drop nonetheless. I think the F1 has been lost in the shuffle this weekend on the BBC, due to the Six Nations taking up the majority of BBC One on Saturday. It meant that less people watched Qualifying with the broadcaster than normal, thus potentially affecting Sunday’s rating too.

Interestingly, and the first time I have said this in a long time, Sky’s coverage was up year-on-year. From 05:00 to 08:30, Sky Sports F1 averaged 594k (21.1%), peaking with 945k (21.5%) at 07:35. This compares with 517k (20.9%) in 2013 and 621k (26.8%) in 2012. The ‘split show’ appears to have worked if the intention was to bring in more viewers, although I think it will only have a bigger influence for the early morning rounds, where more people are bound to record the action.

This brings us to a combined average of 3.47m, down on 3.57m. The issue here is that, yes, a Sky gain of 73k is great for them, but if BBC loses nearly 200k, it eradicates whatever gain Sky is made. Due to the audience levels, if BBC lose or gain, it will flip flop massively either way, which is unlikely to happen with Sky. An issue with the BBC overnight ratings for the past few years is that the Scottish Cup final has meant that the F1 has been displaced to BBC Two. The BBC One overnights in this piece include Scotland viewers, so if the Scottish Cup final was lower profile than last year, that may have had an affect too. Also, whilst a combined average of 3.47m is ‘okay’ versus 2012 (which averaged 3.35m), it is a far cry from the BBC exclusive figures from 2009 to 2011, which I feel is important to remember.

Qualifying
Note that there are no comparisons with last year, given that the session was red flagged on the Saturday, which depleted the averages all around. As for 2014, Sky Sports F1’s coverage of Qualifying performed well in the early hours of Saturday night. The live programme, from 05:00 to 07:45 averaged 307k (15.5%), peaking with 549k towards the end of the session. The average looks healthy because it is, in fact higher than their 2012 viewing figure which was below 300k. So, they have good reason to be happy with that.

On the flip side, Sky1’s simulcast added only 32k (1.6%) during the timeslot, which shows how poorly the simulcast was promoted. It begs the question of what the purpose of the simulcast is if no promotion is going to be given. Had there have been ample promotion for the Sky1 simulcast, I’d bet that 32k being at least three or four times higher.

Later on, BBC F1’s highlights coverage on BBC Two from 14:55 to 16:25 averaged 1.35m (12.1%), peaking with 1.62m (14.1%). The combined average is therefore marginally down on 2012, but also the lowest since 2007. Whilst very disappointing, the reasoning for that in my opinion is due to mitigating circumstances, specifically the Six Nations which took a big slice out of the Formula 1 audience.

The 2013 Australian Grand Prix ratings report can be found here.

ITV4 to screen inaugural Formula E season

ITV4 is to screen the inaugural Formula E season exclusively live, it has been confirmed. The championship confirmed that the channel will be screening all ten rounds live, and more importantly where the success of the series is confirmed, free to air. The dates of the ten rounds are as follows, all on Saturdays, UK time listed:

– China (Beijing) – September 13th, 2014 – 09:00
– Malaysia (Putrajaya) – November 22nd, 2014 – 08:00
– Uruguay (Punta del Este) – December 13th, 2014 – 18:00
– Argentina (Buenos Aires) – January 10th, 2015 – 19:00
– tba – February 14th, 2015 – tba
– USA (Miami) – March 14th, 2015 – 20:00
– USA (Los Angeles) – April 4th, 2015 – 00:00
– Monaco – May 9th, 2015 – 15:00
– Germany (Berlin) – May 30th, 2015 – 15:00
– United Kingdom (London) – June 27th, 2015 – 16:00

Ali Russell, Chief Marketing Officer at Formula E, said: “We’re delighted to be announcing this partnership with ITV today and to be securing live, free-to-air coverage of all Formula E races for our UK fans – of which we’re confident there will be many. The UK is widely considered the home of motor sport and a very important market for Formula E. As such, with its unrivalled commitment to motor sport, ITV provides the perfect platform to showcase our new fully-electric series – which will also be racing in London in June 2015 – and to appeal to a new generation of motor sport fans.”

ITV’s coverage will contain a pre-race build-up with practice and qualifying highlights along with post-race reaction and the podium, all in a 90 minute standalone programme. Given that the races are set to last an hour, that doesn’t leave a lot of room for manoeuvre, but I suspect things can be extended if necessary. I’m not sure how the Saturday slots will do from a ratings point of view, but three races are in primetime later this year so I’ll be fascinated if they can get near to a million viewers potentially. Niall Sloane, ITV’s Director of Sport said: “I’m delighted ITV4 will be able to bring viewers the opportunity to see this innovative new series – which promises top-level open-wheel racing with the iconic backdrops of some of the world’s most famous cities. The coverage of this series adds another new dimension to ITV4’s motor sport portfolio.”

Even though I am unsure that the electric formula will appeal to me, this is simply fantastic news for motor sport fans. I’ve made several comments about ITV4 and motor sport, but in my opinion, this cements ITV4 as the home of motor sport. And its brilliant news for Formula E too, dare I say a coup. It was reported back in December that BT Sport and BSkyB were in the running to screen the series. I’m happy that hasn’t happened. Because if it did happen, Formula E would have sunk without trace. This news gives Formula E a big platform to start with and the potential to build from there. AUTOSPORT says that the highlights will be shared with a pay-TV channel, not that it particularly matters at this stage given the ITV4 news.

It will be interesting to see what happens with regards a potential line-up, whether ITV Sport add their touch, as alluded to above, or whether they will just take the main Formula E feed. ITV4’s motor sport portfolio now is as follows:

– Formula E (live)
– British Touring Car Championship (live)
– MotoGP (highlights)
– British Superbikes (highlights)
– World Rally Championship (highlights)

Along with cycling, including the Tour de France. You can’t argue with that, can you? Four wheels, two wheels, tarmac, gravel, ITV4 has it covered. A good news day if you’re a Formula E fan.

Schedule details last updated on September 14th, 2014.

Scheduling: The 2014 Qatar MotoGP

A new dawn begins this Thursday as BT Sport’s live coverage of MotoGP begins, having secured the rights from BBC and British Eurosport. Whilst it means that MotoGP is not live on terrestrial television, the news is not all negative: last week this blog broke the news that ITV4 would be screening highlights on Monday evenings. Even now I’m still miffed and confused as to why it happened in the way it did (why was ITV’s deal not announced earlier?), why BT Sport promoted their coverage as exclusive (without the ‘live’ addendum), but it is what it is.

So, who is on BT Sport’s team? The bad news is that it is not Toby Moody alongside Julian Ryder. The good news instead, harking back to their Sky Sports’ days in the mid-1990s, is that it will be Keith Huewen alongside Ryder. Neil Hodgson and James Toseland will analyse and give their opinion on the action, with Matt Birt and Gavin Emmett also taking part in proceedings. Presenting it, a surprising name: Melanie Sykes. In a poll conducted on this blog, the response was negative, however a lot of people were willing to give it a chance before forming an opinion on the line-up. It looks like BT will have formal presentation on each day, although on what scale is unclear, whether we will see the line-up before and after every session or just around the MotoGP sessions and at the start of each programme. The same applies to ITV4’s highlights programme, no idea at this stage if it is just MotoGP or whether Moto2 and Moto3 will be covered too.

In terms of viewing figures, time will tell just how much MotoGP stands to lose from the deal. I know those in the paddock will argue that this deal is good because of the increased revenue teams will get as a result. For me, personally, yes, of course, quality plays a part, but you need to have bums on seats. If that isn’t happening, you have to question the entire logic of the deal. Personally, I think ~200k on BT Sport and ~500k on ITV4 would be great numbers, and definitely something I will be basing my Qatar viewing figures post on. I do wonder why the opening race is on BT Sport 2 though. If you want to reach the biggest amount of viewers, you put it on the main channel, even if it does mean a channel switch beforehand. The jury is still out on whether this really is good news for motorcycle racing, as you risk making it a niche sport again instead of having that terrestrial television platform to reach out to the masses. Hopefully with the addition of ITV4’s highlights we have the right mix for the deal to succeed. We’ll see what happens.

What I think needs to be said is that BT have a fantastic line-up of shows heading into Qatar, with a lot of MotoGP films on offer. I don’t know however if they are BT created films or Dorna created films. The reason why I say that is obviously when comparing with Sky Sports F1, Formula One Management have not created any documentaries for them, so it would be interesting to compare. As for the here and now, below are all the scheduling details you need for Qatar. I don’t plan to do the MotoGP schedule for each race, but given that this is the start of a new broadcasting era, it is definitely worth detailing what BT have in store for viewers. For the classic MotoGP details, please click here.

Monday 17th March
22:00 to 23:00 – Films: MotoGP 2013 Review (BT Sport 2)
23:00 to 00:00 – Films: Moto2 & Moto3 2013 Review (BT Sport 2)

Tuesday 18th March
15:30 to 16:45 – Films: Head to Head (BT Sport 2)
16:45 to 18:00 – Films: The Route to Glory (BT Sport 2)
18:00 to 20:00 – Films: A Decade in MotoGP (BT Sport 2)
20:00 to 21:00 – 2014 Season Preview (BT Sport 2)
21:00 to 22:30 – Films: Great Moments (BT Sport 2)
22:30 to 00:00 – Films: Jorge (BT Sport 2)

Wednesday 19th March
16:15 to 17:30 – Films: The Age of 27 (BT Sport 2)
17:30 to 19:00 – Films: Rookie 93: Marc Marquez Beyond the Smile (BT Sport 2)

Thursday 20th March
15:00 to 19:45 – Practice (BT Sport 2)
– 15:00 – Moto3 – Practice 1
– 15:55 – Moto2 – Practice 1
– 16:55 – MotoGP – Practice 1
– 17:55 – Moto3 – Practice 2
– 18:50 – Moto2 – Practice 2

Friday 21st March
14:50 to 19:00 – Practice (BT Sport 2)
– 15:00 – MotoGP – Practice 2
– 16:00 – Moto3 – Practice 3
– 16:55 – Moto2 – Practice 3
– 17:55 – MotoGP – Practice 3

Saturday 22nd March
14:30 to 19:00 – Practice / Qualifying (BT Sport 2)
– 15:00 – Moto3 – Qualifying
– 15:55 – Moto2 – Qualifying
– 16:55 – MotoGP – Practice 4
– 17:35 – MotoGP – Qualifying

Sunday 23rd March
15:00 to 17:15 – Moto3: Race (BT Sport 2)
17:15 to 18:45 – Moto2: Race (BT Sport 2)
18:45 to 20:30 – MotoGP: Race (BT Sport 2)

Monday 24th March
20:00 to 21:00 – Highlights (ITV4)

As always, I will update the schedule if anything changes.

Survey: Your Formula 1 2014 television viewing habits

Last year, I did a poll on this blog looking at blog readers Formula 1 television viewing habits. The poll was successful, with around 200 responses. I released the results in April and did some analysis. A year on since then, and now heading into year three of the current BBC and Sky contract, I thought it would be a good idea to replicate the poll to see what has changed, and if anything has changed drastically.

For those that did this last year, the questions are largely similar, but there are a few minor differences.

Q1: Where do you currently reside?
Q2: Have your viewing habits or situation changed between 2013 and 2014?
Q3: What pay-TV platform do you subscribe to?
Q4: BSkyB subscribers: What is your status regarding Sky Sports F1?
Q5: Virgin Media subscribers: What is your status regarding Sky Sports F1?
Q6: What shows on Sky Sports F1 have you watched?
Q7: How did you consume Formula 1 in 2013? [Sky live races]
Q8: How do you plan to consume Formula 1 in 2014? [Sky live races]
Q9: How did you consume Formula 1 in 2013? [BBC and Sky live races]
Q10: How do you plan to consume Formula 1 in 2014? [BBC and Sky live races]
Q11: BBC F1 – 2013 vs 2014
Q12: Sky Sports F1 – 2013 vs 2014
Q13: Have the changes to the BBC team made you…
Q14: Have the changes to the Sky Sports F1 team made you…
Q15: Sky Sports F1 as a standalone channel: the price per month?
Q16: Further comments

Questions 1 through to 3 are overview questions, whilst questions 4 to 10 drill down into your individual consumption of Formula 1. After that are the BBC and Sky Sports F1 year-on-year comparisons for questions 11 to 14. A new addition concerns the possibility of having Sky Sports F1 as a standalone channel. I personally would be interested in such an option, but I’m interested in seeing how much blog readers would be willing to pay for it realistically.

Note that if you live outside of the United Kingdom, you will be taken straight to Question 16, where you are welcome to write some comments on the broadcasting situation in your country. There are also branches throughout, no one should see both questions 4 and 5. If anyone does spot any issues, do let me know. And as noted, comments made there may be used when analysing the results in a future blog post. If there are many comments from international readers, then I may do a future post around that subject.

The survey can be found here. The results will be published in mid-April 2014.

ITV4 wins rights to screen MotoGP highlights

ITV4 is to screen MotoGP highlights throughout the 2014 season, The F1 Broadcasting Blog can confirm.

The channel, beginning with Qatar, will be screening highlights shows from Monday 24th March at 20:00. This will continue throughout the remainder of the season, with the highlights shows also being uploaded to the ITV Player. The announcement bolsters ITV’s motor sport portfolio even further, from the Isle of Man TT, onto the British Touring Car Championship and now MotoGP. I assume this will be a package provided by Dorna, a bit like the World Rally Championship, rather than an ITV created package.

Last May, BT Sport were announced as the exclusive rights holders to screen the MotoGP World Championship from 2014 through to and including 2018, along with the feeder Moto2 and Moto3 series’. On several occasions, I pressed Dorna, asking why they were, in my opinion, “shrinking the audience by potentially 75 percent if not more” with no free to air coverage. Interestingly, the latest BT Sport announcements last month concerning MotoGP still contained this: “BT Sport has a five-year deal with Dorna Sports for exclusive rights to televise motorcycle racing’s premier contest.”

I have no idea what has prompted an almost 180 degree u-turn from Dorna on their stance. Whether this was always the plan, I do not know, however it looks suspect to me that the word ‘exclusive’ is mentioned in every BT Sport announcement, yet that won’t actually be the case. It is great news for the MotoGP fan that cannot afford BT Sport, as it means that there will be some form of free to air coverage available, almost a ‘shop window’ for the championship is the best way I could describe it. Yes, it is not live coverage, but it is better than nothing at all which is what the reality was going to look like.

A statement from ITV will be added to this post either today or on Monday, with hopefully more concrete details.

Update on March 10th – In a statement to The F1 Broadcasting Blog, ITV said “Although we can’t give out schedule information, I can confirm that we do have the rights to the [MotoGP] highlights.” For all MotoGP fans, this is fantastic news, and also welcome news. I would be surprised if we don’t get a press release in the next few days, but we shall see.

Update on March 21st – Press release from ITV can be found here. ITV’s Director of Sport Niall Sloane said: “I’m delighted we will be able to bring viewers live coverage of wheel-to-wheel racing in the world’s most famous cities in Formula E, and the high-octane action of the MotoGP circuit. These new deals, along with those for domestic events, highlight the importance of motorsport to ITV4 and add to the wealth of free to air coverage we’re able to bring motorsport fans throughout the year.”

Update on March 24th – ITV are taking BT’s commentary from Keith Huewen and Julian Ryder, with Gavin Emmett doing voice over. They’re also taking BT Sport’s interviews. The show structure appears to be extended MotoGP highlights for the first 40 minutes, with shorter Moto2 and Moto3 highlights. The programme was indeed a BT Sport production.