Virgin Media launch Anywhere service; Sky Sports F1 included

Virgin Media have today launched their ‘Virgin TV Anywhere’ service, which will allow their customers to watch live television on the move wherever they are. Similar to Sky Go, customers will either be able to watch television live online or via their app, which is available via the App Store if you have iPad, iPod or iPhone.

Alongside watching live television on the move, the Anywhere service features TV on Demand, including Sky Sports. I don’t know whether there are any Sky Sports F1 shows currently available via Anywhere’s TV on Demand section, but thought it was worth noting anyway.

What this means is that if you subscribe to Virgin Media and their Sports package, you can now watch Sky Sports F1 on the move. From a Formula 1 fan perspective, the timing is good, with the US Grand Prix in primetime, it means those with Virgin Media and the Sports package can now watch the race live online if others are watching TV. I should note though that currently, Sky Sports F1 is not available via the ‘Virgin TV Anywhere’ App due to rights restrictions, the same restriction also applying to the other Sky channels. But nevertheless, it is good news for Virgin Media customers who don’t always get to watch Sky Sports F1 via the television.

Virgin Media customers can access ‘Virgin TV Anywhere’ by clicking here.

The Twitter outlook

A surprise winner in Abu Dhabi brings no big surprises in the Twitter outlook, because Kimi Raikkonen does not have Twitter. So, if you are a member of the Lotus team and happen to reading, please do all you can to bring Raikkonen onto Twitter so we can see what he has to say…. if anything!

Drivers – The Top 10
01 – 1,228,067 – Fernando Alonso (Ferrari)
02 – 1,223,218 – Jenson Button (McLaren)
03 – 1,189,790 – Lewis Hamilton (McLaren)
04 – 515,046 – Bruno Senna (Williams)
05 – 476,805 – Mark Webber (Red Bull)
06 – 332,087 – Sergio Perez (Sauber)
07 – 294,039 – Pastor Maldonaldo (Williams)
08 – 214,847 – Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)
09 – 202,119 – Felipe Massa (Ferrari)
10 – 192,733 – Pedro de la Rosa (HRT)

Drivers – Biggest Increases
01 – 27,299 – Fernando Alonso
02 – 15,908 – Lewis Hamilton
03 – 9,076 – Jenson Button
04 – 5,680 – Mark Webber
05 – 4,301 – Felipe Massa

Drivers – Smallest Increases
01 – 569 – Charles Pic
02 – 631 – Timo Glock
03 – 894 – Vitaly Petrov
04 – 1,029 – Daniel Ricciardo
05 – 1,040 – Jean-Eric Vergne

A big week for Ferrari’s drivers in the series as Fernando Alonso overtakes Jenson Button to move into the lead! It is worth noting here that Button has had Twitter for a lot longer than Alonso, Alonso and Felipe Massa only getting Twitter in March thanks to Ferrari’s Twitter stance. Massa has also hit a milestone this week, having crossed the 200,000 follower barrier.

The top five biggest increases are the same as last week, except Webber recorded a higher gain than Massa.

Teams – The Top 10
01 – 367,624 – Ferrari
02 – 255,163 – McLaren
03 – 182,068 – Red Bull
04 – 161,476 – Mercedes
05 – 152,054 – Lotus
06 – 91,367 – Caterham
07 – 88,396 – Marussia
08 – 87,899 – Force India
09 – 87,426 – Sauber
10 – 79,176 – Williams

Teams – Biggest Increases
01 – 6,450 – Ferrari
02 – 3,980 – Lotus
03 – 3,926 – Red Bull

Teams – Smallest Increases
01 – 673 – Caterham
02 – 815 – Williams
03 – 919 – HRT

Lotus move up into second in the biggest increases, but considering Williams had a 7,000 follower gain in May for the Spain win, I’m surprised Lotus’ gain was not higher.

Driver and Team statistics as of Monday 5th November 2012.

Sky Sports F1 – Top 10 ratings (week ending 28th October, 2012)

From BARB:

1 – 604k – Live Indian Grand Prix (Sunday, 08:00)
2 – 321k – Live Indian Grand Prix: Qualifying (Saturday, 08:30)
3 – 66k – Britain’s Next F1 Star (Sunday, 12:47)
4 – 55k – Porsche Supercup: Belgium (Saturday, 11:15)
5 – 54k – Live Indian Grand Prix: Practice 2 (Friday, 09:15)
6 – 46k – Live Indian Grand Prix: Practice 3 (Saturday, 06:15)
7 – 40k – Indian Grand Prix: Qualifying Replay (Saturday, 12:45)
8 – 34k – Indian Grand Prix Replay (Sunday, 13:17)
9 – 31k – Live Indian Grand Prix: Practice 3 (Thursday, 29:15)
10 – 31k – Porsche Supercup: Italy (Saturday, 11:30)

Update on March 4th – Data now inserted.

Abu Dhabi Grand Prix peaks with nearly six million viewers

Yesterday’s live coverage for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix peaked with nearly six million viewers across BBC One and Sky Sports F1, overnight figures show. According to James Allen, BBC One’s coverage peaked with 4.8 million, with Sky Sports F1’s coverage expected to add a further 0.8 million to 1.0 million to that figure, bringing the figure to near 6 million. When you put that into context with the remainder of this season against sporting competition at times, that is a very solid figure in my opinion.

The peak figure is up on last year’s 5.52 million five-minute peak figure recorded at 13:35, whilst it is in-line with a fifteen-minute peak of 5.9 million in 2009. It is, however, down on the mammoth peak of 7.35 million viewers from 2010, although that was thanks to the 2010 race being a title decider involving four different drivers.

On BBC One, ITV Media reports that the BBC coverage averaged 3.895 million viewers, with a 29 percent share from 12:10 to 15:30. Sky Sports F1’s coverage averaged under 574,000 viewers from 11:30 to 16:15, meaning a combined average around the 4.4 million mark, which would be the lowest average yet. If you were to compare like to like though, taking the Sky Sports F1 average from 12:10 to 15:30, you would probably find that rise slightly, albeit marginally below the 4.56 million from 2011 and below 4.8 million (2009) and 5.78 million (2010).

Admittedly there is not a plethora of information above, so I note that Sascha Mohr, who runs a German media blog posted the German ratings from yesterday over on his Twitter feed. In Germany, 7.18 million viewers watched on RTL, 430k on Sky Deutschland and 780k on ORF. Compared to the 85% to 15% or 80% to 20% we see here for BBC versus Sky, in Germany it is a similar split it seems between RTL and Sky/ORF if not slightly higher. The figures are very good for Germany, as this historical comparison shows figures over there peaked with 10.4 million viewers average in 2001 during Michael Schumacher’s third title defence.

Figures were always above 8 million during his title reigns with Ferrari, although as the graph shows they were not as high during his first two title reigns at Benetton. In any case, it appears that Sebastian Vettel is definitely popular in Germany, whether he is as popular as Schumacher was at his peak remains to be seen though. Nevertheless, I thought it would be good to include German figures seeing as I spotted though as we rarely get those figures.

Chris Evans rules himself out of BBC F1 presenter

Chris Evans has today ruled himself out the BBC Formula 1 presenter position, following the vacancy left by Jake Humphrey in September. Evans, in his Daily Mail column, said that he went to a meeting for the role, but said “it would be unfair on everyone involved for me to be given a job I don’t really have the time to do.” It is not particularly surprising to see him linked to the role in the first place being a big Formula 1 fan, but at the same point, not surprising to see him not taking it. The thing with Formula 1 is that it takes up a major proportion of the year, 20 races and four or five days at each weekend takes up a significant amount of time.

Whilst Evans has ruled himself out, he does suggest Clare Balding or Gabby Logan for the presenter position, the latter I suggested as a main possibility on the day of Humphrey’s departure. Being a BBC employee helps and Logan as far as I am aware does not do a lot of work currently with BBC. Balding, however, is unlikely to zero on the basis that she was unveiled as presenter of Channel 4’s racing coverage a few months ago.

The interesting thing about Evans blog on the Daily Mail website is that it also includes a list of suggestions for the BBC Formula 1 presenter’s job… directly from Jake Humphrey. Humphrey suggests, and I’ll go through this one by one:

– Julia Bradbury: I had to Google this, I knew she presents Countryfile currently, but did not realise that she presented Speedway on Channel 4 in the early 2000’s. I guess it is always possible, but she does a lot of work for BBC at the moment, and I don’t see her ditching that for Formula 1 around the world. I’d rate this as unlikely.
– Lee McKenzie: The lead candidate having been with BBC F1 since its inception in 2009. A safe pair of hands, a lot of experience means McKenzie is highly likely to get the position.
– Suzi Perry: Perry was ousted as MotoGP presenter on BBC at the end of 2010, so I don’t forsee her joining the Formula 1 team. I think this is unlikely to happen.
– Steve Rider: Like McKenzie, Rider would be a safe pair of hands. But would he want to exchange the BTCC and his F1 Legends commitments at Sky with presenting BBC F1 for a second time? Possibly, but I’m not so sure he would want to go travelling around the world with an ever demanding Formula 1 schedule.
– Phillip Schofield: No chance. One of ITV’s biggest presenters (This Morning, Dancing on Ice, Mr and Mrs to name three shows), and if BBC tried to get him, they’d have to offer him a lot of money to get him to do it.

As always, I may be completely wrong, but they are my thoughts looking at the suggestions. I still think McKenzie is the most likely. We’re in November now, so we should know in the next month or two for definite what is happening.