The motor sport angle as ITV takes over horse racing

Sports rights are transferring like flies at the moment, and the latest move is no exception. The Racing Post are this evening reporting that ITV will be broadcasting horse racing from January 1st, 2017. The Racing Post are your AUTOSPORT of horse racing, so expect the news to be made official very soon. The report is significant, given the announcement two weeks ago that Channel 4 would be broadcasting Formula 1 from this season onwards, taking over the BBC’s contract which was set to last until 2018.

Notably, the Racing Post’s article says that ITV’s deal for horse racing is £30 million over 4 years, which works out at £7.5 million per year. Based on the BBC’s previous deal, we expect Channel 4’s current Formula 1 deal to be in the region of £15 million to £20 million per year. Quite clearly, the maths does not add up, it was either going to be one or the other for Channel 4, not both.

I have three questions:

a) did Bernie Ecclestone want to do a deal with Channel 4 more than ITV?
b) did ITV want horse racing more than Formula 1?
c) did ITV want Formula 1, but were unwilling to commit to 2016?

How exactly the chain of events went, we do not know. From a 2016 perspective, the good news for Formula 1 is that you imagine the Grand Prix will get preferential treatment in the event of any clash between it and horse racing on Channel 4. As noted in my calendar predictions post, there will definitely be clashes of some degree between Formula 1 and horse racing on Channel 4. The news this evening means that, in the event of a clash, I would expect horse racing to be relegated to More4, assuming it is not a major race.

From an ITV perspective, Racing Post notes that the majority of race days are “expected” to be shown on ITV4. There is no imminent threat to the British Touring Car Championship on ITV4, as a deal was recently signed through to 2022. I think horse racing and the BTCC will co-exist fine, it may affect one or two BTCC races, but I don’t foresee a major problem for the championship.

The bigger problem may be Formula E, although it is currently unknown if ITV have rights for that in season three. I’m not convinced that ITV will be paying anything for Formula E’s rights, based on the viewing figures for season two so far. On the subject of ratings, and I quote from Racing Post:

Since controversially acquiring the BBC’s crown jewels from the start of 2013, Channel 4’s tenure as racing’s sole terrestrial partner has been beset by disastrous ratings for most marquee fixtures. Royal Ascot has lost half its viewers, the Derby’s figure last year plummeted to a record low, and British Champions Day has had its audience collapse from an average of 1.1m in the BBC’s final year to just 367,000 last October.

One aspect this site has not focussed on too much since the Channel 4 announcement is viewing figures. BBC’s Formula 1 race day coverage in 2015 averaged 3.11 million viewers according to overnight viewing figures. Immediately, you can see why Formula 1 is a better prospect for Channel 4 than horse racing, even if the 2015 season performed poorly due to the dominance of Mercedes. However, the above paragraph makes for worrying reading, and suggests that a drop in numbers with the transfer from BBC to Channel 4 is inevitable. I would agree, simply because Channel 4 does not have the ‘pull’ of BBC in terms of TV, radio and online.

But how far will Formula 1’s terrestrial television numbers drop? A drop of 10 percent year-on-year leaves you with 2.80 million viewers. If numbers dropped by 25 percent, you are looking at an average of 2.33 million viewers for Channel 4’s race day coverage. If you went even further and said Formula 1’s numbers will decrease by 40 percent compared with 2015, the overnight average drops to 1.87 million viewers.

Formula 1 needs to be one of Channel 4’s centrepieces and the removal of horse racing from their portfolio helps in that respect.

Scheduling: The 2015 Punta del Este ePrix

The second season of the Formula E championship continues next weekend live from Punta del Este in Uruguay, with all the race action live on ITV4. Jennie Gow will present the action, as of writing guests are to be confirmed.

Preceding the race on ITV4 will be a new Formula E magazine show called Sound of the Future. The first three episodes were aired out of the limelight, and episode four premièred last weekend. Each episode was uploaded to the ITV Hub, but were only available for seven days meaning that they have since been removed, which seems a bit of a shame. Either way, episode four will air again next Saturday before the Uruguay race day programme.

Also as of writing, ITV4 will not be showing the Punta del Este qualifying session live, meaning it should be available for UK viewers to watch online via Formula E’s website.

> FREE Full Race Replay – 2015 Beijing ePrix
> FREE Full Race Replay – 2015 Putrajaya ePrix

Below are all the scheduling details you need…

Formula E – Punta del Este (online via FIAFormulaE.com)
19/11 – 11:10 to 12:10 – Practice 1
19/11 – 13:25 to 14:10 – Practice 2
19/11 – 14:45 to 16:10 – Qualifying

Formula E – Punta del Este
19/12 – 17:20 to 20:30 (ITV4)
=> 17:20 – Sound of the Future: Episode 4
=> 18:00 – Race
20/12 – 09:25 to 10:20 – Highlights (ITV)

As always I will update the schedule if anything changes.

News round-up: ITV extends BTCC contract, Formula E highlights go global

Before I get into the round-up, no news on anything BBC F1 related concerning 2016. If we hear nothing before Christmas, we have to assume that things are staying the same for next season. Hopefully we will have direct confirmation one way or the other soon.

Formula E creates highlights programme for YouTube… but is it uploaded by a robot?
For those of you who are unable to watch the full session replays on the Formula E website because of geo-blocking, or new contractual agreements mean that you can no longer access the series, there is some good news. A 50-minute highlights programme will now be uploaded to YouTube one week after each ePrix, with no restrictions in place. Beijing and Putrajaya‘s extended highlights are already online.

Unfortunately Formula E has gone a few steps backwards in the accessibility ranks recently, but the move to upload an extended highlights programme to YouTube is certainly a sensible move. As usual, the question is whether anyone will (or has) noticed. You can do the best thing in the world, but if you do not communicate the message to the right people, you’re in a problematical situation. I am hopeful that things will improve for the Punta del Este ePrix in three weeks time, it should be better for the production team generally that the race takes place in a European friendly time zone.

Speaking of scheduling, whilst Battersea Park and Mexico are definitely taking place, question marks remain about Berlin, unfortunately the calendar for the second year running is fragile. That is the nature of having a series that takes place primarily on temporary circuits, inevitably things that are more important contextually will emerge.

Lastly on Formula E, I would be surprised if Roborace is covered live anywhere. The news was covered widely by a lot of technology outlets, and reached the people it needed to, such as the BBC, Mashable, Wired and The Verge. It is a great news story in my eyes for Formula E, and (coming from a Computing background) I’m fascinated to see how exactly the Roborace goes down. I look forward to the first Roborace testing session at Donington Park (because that surely will be a thing?) next Summer.

BTCC and ITV extend agreement
The main news on the rights front actually comes from ITV, with the announcement that they have extended their agreement to broadcast the British Touring Car Championship until 2022, taking their contract into a twentieth year. It is ITV’s longest agreement in history with the championship. Although viewing figures for the series have dropped recently, it is still fantastic news for the series and for fans, maintaining their presence on free-to-air television in the UK.

It also shows again that the championship, from a broadcasting perspective, clearly considers exposure over funding. I imagine they could get more money off a pay-TV partner, but choose not to in order to reach the widest possible audience. Okay, as mentioned numbers have dropped, but BTCC are unlikely to find another partner who are willing to dedicate the amount of airtime that ITV4 does to the championship.

Although this contract does not take effect until 2017, reading the article on the BTCC website, it looks like nothing has changed versus this deal. The timing is interesting, given that there have been rumours recently about ITV potentially being in the F1 race soon should BBC opt out. However, ITV have broadcast BTCC and F1 at the same time previously, from 2002 to 2008 they held the contract for both series.

In relation to Formula 1, Alan Gow said “the fact that we enjoy more live free-to-air television that even Formula 1 in the UK is testament to not only the BTCC but also the dedication and passion expressed by the ITV Sport team.”

Race of Champions makes history
Live coverage of the Race of Champions averaged 54k (0.4%) on Saturday 21st November on Sky Sports F1 from 15:00 according to overnight viewing figures, which will have been significantly up on the channel’s slot average during non-F1 race weekends. It was surprising to see Sky in their studio considering the Olympic Stadium is only an hour journey away from the studio.

You could say that the event made a bit of history, as Martin Haven was commentating alongside Jennie Gow for the World Feed coverage, which Sky largely used interspersed with studio discussion. Haven noted on Twitter that Gow would become UK’s first female motor sport commentator by commentating on the event, which is an amazing achievement. On the main stream motor sport outlets (I’m thinking BBC, Sky, ITV and BT to some extent) we have female presenters and pit lane reporters, but I do not ever recall a female commentator commentating on motor sport. It was a welcome change. and I enjoyed listening to a different voice during the proceedings.

MotoGP finale peaks with 433k on BT Sport

A peak audience of 433k watched Jorge Lorenzo clinch the 2015 MotoGP championship live on BT Sport, overnight viewing figures show.

MotoGP and Moto3 hit BT Sport highs
Live coverage of the final MotoGP round of the season from Valencia averaged 345k (3.3%) from 12:30 to 14:00 on BT Sport 2, peaking with 433k (3.9%) in the 5-minute period from 13:40. Unsurprisingly, the peak figure is nearly triple last year’s peak of 151k (1.5%) when the title had already been decided.

The Moto3 race, which saw Danny Kent claim Britain’s first Grand Prix motorcycle title since 1977, peaked with 217k (2.4%) at 10:40. The entire programme, excluding Chequered Flag from 09:30 to 14:15, averaged a strong 205k (2.1%). ITV4’s highlights programme actually fared worse than BT Sport’s live MotoGP race. An average audience of 331k (1.5%) watched ITV4’s highlights on Monday evening at 20:00, peaking with 381k (1.7%) in the 5-minutes from 20:35. ITV4’s MotoGP shows have performed worse year-on-year, for the Monday airings at least, with the pendulum swinging towards BT Sport – noticeably there is now around a 50/50 audience split between the two broadcasters, something that was not the case last year.

It should be noted that ITV4 have added a lot of MotoGP repeats into their schedule this year, but my motto is not to add in multiple highlights, otherwise where do you stop? In 2013, when Marc Marquez beat Lorenzo to the championship, an average audience of 1.21m (11.9%) watched on BBC Two, with a peak of 1.49m (14.0%) recorded. Including British Eurosport, that number jumps to around 1.7m. The combined peak in 2015 of 814k is not the highest under this current contract, that honour remains with Qatar 2014 which recorded a combined peak of 833k. So viewing figures for the finale were down around half what they were in 2013, on your traditional devices at least.

I believe Sunday’s figures were BT Sport’s highest ever outside of football, so they will be happy with the numbers. As always, all figures exclude the BT Sport app and similarly BBC iPlayer from 2013.

Formula E struggles, but up year-on-year
Elsewhere, live coverage of Formula E from Putrajaya averaged just 23k (1.6%) from 05:00 to 07:30 on Saturday on ITV4. That number includes anyone who recorded the live programme and watched it before 02:00 on Sunday morning. The audience peaked (5-minute measure) with 58k (4.9%) ten minutes into the race. Last year, Putrajaya averaged 66k (5.1%), peaking with 137k (7.2%).

Highlights on Sunday morning fared significantly better, benefiting from the slot on ITV’s flagship channel. An audience of 201k (2.8%) watched, which compares with the 95k (0.5%) that watched ITV4’s highlights programme on Saturday evening last year. Formula E’s figures can be spun two different ways. Here are the facts. ITV4’s live coverage, in an identical slot to 2014, dropped 65 percent year-on-year, a very similar percentage drop to Beijing two weeks ago. Including the highlights show, the combined audience is up 40 percent year-on-year, from 160k to 224k.

It is a confusing picture. On one hand you can say, that the combined number is up or you can say that the live airing is down. What you also need to remember is the respective channel slot averages. By default, a programme airing on ITV should get a lot more viewers than on ITV4. However, Formula E’s number of 201k (2.8%) is down on ITV’s slot average. I think Punta del Este will tell a clearer story. My own opinion is that the numbers so far for Formula E’s second season are not good. Punta will either confirm that, or reverse the decline shown for the live numbers on ITV4.

There’s an interesting pattern here. Formula E, MotoGP and BTCC have recorded drops on ITV4 this year/recently, which could imply a wider issue to do with the broadcaster itself rather than an issue with a particular series…

Scheduling: The 2015 Valencian MotoGP / Putrajaya ePrix

The 2015 MotoGP season, which has seen some fantastic racing and amazing battles, comes to a controversial conclusion this upcoming weekend in Valencia. It is Valentino Rossi versus Jorge Lorenzo for the MotoGP championship. Following the events in Sepang, Rossi starts Valencia from the back of the grid for his collision with Marc Marquez. I wouldn’t want to predict what will happen in Valencia given that the situation is extremely volatile.

What I do know is that anyone broadcasting MotoGP next weekend will be in line for some bumper viewing figures, including BT Sport who I would expect to smash their current MotoGP record high peak figure of 330k (4.4%) from Le Mans.

Elsewhere, it is the second round of the 2015-16 Formula E season, taking place in Putrajaya, Malaysia. Action will air live on ITV4 on Saturday morning with highlights on Sunday on ITV.

MotoGP – Valencia (BT Sport 2)
06/11 – 08:00 to 15:00
=> 08:00 – Practice 1
=> 10:45 – Reaction and Build-Up
=> 12:00 – Practice 2
07/11 – 08:00 to 15:15
=> 08:00 – Practice 3
=> 11:00 – Qualifying
08/11 – 07:30 to 09:15 – Warm Up
08/11 – 09:30 to 15:00
=> 09:30 – Moto3 race
=> 11:15 – Moto2 race
=> 12:45 – MotoGP race
=> 14:00 – Chequered Flag

MotoGP – Valencia (ITV4)
09/11 – 20:00 to 21:00 – Highlights

Formula E – Putrajaya (online via FIAFormulaE.com)
This assumes the UK does have access to the live streaming service, after confusion in Beijing.
07/11 – 23:45 (Friday) to 01:10 – Practice 1
07/11 – 01:45 to 03:10 – Qualifying

Formula E – Putrajaya
07/11 – 05:00 to 07:30 – Race (ITV4)
08/11 – 09:25 to 10:20 – Highlights (ITV)

As always I will update the schedule if anything changes.