Scheduling: ‘Senna Week’

On May 1st, 1994, Formula 1 lost one of the greatest, if not the greatest driver that this sport has ever seen. At 14:17, at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari circuit in Italy, Ayrton Senna was killed. To celebrate his life, Sky Sports F1 will be commemorating Senna in a series of special programming to air from Saturday 26th April to Friday 2nd May.

The week begins with ‘The Last Team Mate’ as Damon Hill visits the Imola circuit to relive the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix which killed his team mate, and Roland Ratzenberger, who Sky will pay tribute to in a separate half an hour show. Alongside a journalists special featuring Murray Walker and The F1 Show Special, the week will see Sky Sports F1 air a previously unseen interview with Alain Prost talking about the three time champion.

Nigel Roebuck speaks about Senna in ‘Echoes of the Past’, whilst Ted Kravitz visits the McLaren Technology Centre in a special edition of his Notebook. Also airing is a new edition of F1 Legends focussing on Senna, ‘A Winning Partnership’ and seven of Senna’s classic races. Everything below is on Sky Sports F1 unless otherwise specified.

Saturday 26th April
20:00 to 21:00 – The Last Team Mate
– with Damon Hill
21:00 to 21:45 – 1984 Monaco Grand Prix Highlights

Sunday 27th April
20:00 to 21:00 – Senna Journalist Special
– presented by Simon Lazenby with Murray Walker, Maurice Hamilton and David Tremayne
20:30 to 21:00 – The Boy from Brazil (BBC Radio 5 Live)
– 55-minute version repeated on Monday 5th May at 12:00 on BBC Radio Norfolk
21:00 to 22:00 – 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix Highlights

Monday 28th April
20:45 to 21:00 – Echoes of the Past
– with Nigel Roebuck
21:00 to 21:45 – 1987 United States Grand Prix Highlights

Tuesday 29th April
20:30 to 21:00 – Ted’s Senna Notebook
– from McLaren Technology Centre
21:00 to 21:45 – 1988 Japanese Grand Prix Highlights

Wednesday 30th April
20:00 to 20:30 – Remembering Ratzenberger
20:30 to 21:00 – Prost on Senna
– billed as an ‘unseen interview’
21:00 to 21:45 – 1992 Monaco Grand Prix Highlights
21:00 to 22:05 – Racing is in My Blood (Motors TV)

Thursday 1st May
06:00 to 13:00 – ‘Senna’ programming from earlier in the week (R)
13:00 to 13:45 – 1993 European Grand Prix Highlights
13:45 to 17:00 – ‘Senna’ programming from earlier in the week (R)
17:00 to 18:00 – 1986 Spanish Grand Prix Highlights
18:00 to 18:30 – Ted’s Senna Notebook (R)
18:30 to 19:00 – Remembering Ratzenberger (R)
19:00 to 20:00 – A Winning Partnership
– with Ron Dennis
19:30 to 21:00 – Senna Special (BBC Radio 5 Live)
20:00 to 21:00 – F1 Legends: Ayrton Senna
21:00 to 22:30 – 1991 Brazilian Grand Prix Highlights
22:30 to 01:00 – FILM: Senna (ITV4)

Friday 2nd May
20:00 to 21:30 – The F1 Show: Senna Tribute
21:30 to 23:00 – 1989 Japanese Grand Prix Highlights

With seven hours of original programming, plus classic F1 races on top of that, I think it is fair to say that Sky have done a fantastic job in putting the schedule together, and a big ‘thank you’ in their direction for making it an entire week of programming as well.

As an aside, I’m happy there is, quite rightly, a programme focussing on Roland Ratzenberger as well. I imagine some bits have been taken from various F1 Legends episodes, but quite clearly some of it is new, such as the Prost interview. I’ll update the schedule if anything changes.

Update on April 14th – Okay, here’s what has happened filming wise in the past few weeks. Sky filmed at Donington Park on April 8th with some of Senna’s old cars, including the Lotus 98T, Bruno Senna and Martin Brundle at the wheel (click here and here). Yesterday and today (April 13th and 14th), Sky have gone out to Imola to film footage for The Last Team Mate and the Roland Ratzenberger special, with David Brabham and Damon Hill.

Back at base, interviews are being conducted with engineers and personnel who were with Simtek during the 1994 season. Neil Wooding tweeted saying that he has done a piece with Humphrey Corbett, Simtek race engineer, for the Ratzenberger special.

Update on April 15th – ITV4 are screening ‘Senna’ again, whilst BBC Radio has a documentary on Senna’s early years. I can’t see anything in the BBC TV schedules yet, although this is primarily a Sky Sports F1 piece, I’ve added those two bits above.

Update on April 23rd – Based on some comments I heard last weekend during Sky Sports F1’s Chinese Grand Prix coverage, it looks like some of the Donington bits will be shown during their Spanish Grand Prix build-up. A few more details too, notably ‘A Winning Partnership’ appears to be an extended piece with Ron Dennis, whilst the Ratzenberger special is now called ‘Remembering Ratzenberger’. Also added is a 5 Live special on May 1st.

Update on April 24th – Clearly ‘Senna Week’ stretches beyond Sky Sports F1, so I’ve adjusted the page title. Motors TV have a repeat of the documentary ‘Racing is in My Blood’ next Wednesday to mark the anniversary.

Update on April 28th – Monaco 1984 didn’t make the air on Saturday, so it is being shown on Friday at 19:15 (thanks Alex in the comments for the tip).

Bahrain Grand Prix sinks to seven year low

We’ve seen in the past how the scheduling of the North American highlights races on the BBC can dictate how badly a race does. And this was repeated last night, as the Bahrain Grand Prix dropped to its lowest rating since 2007.

Race
Live coverage of the race on Sky Sports F1, won by Lewis Hamilton, averaged 1.00m (6.3%) from 15:00 to 18:30, peaking with 1.55m (8.3%) at 17:40. Perhaps unsurprisingly due to later timeslot, the average for Sky was higher than previous years, 2012 averaged 963k (8.0%) and 2013 averaged 824k (7.6%). Sky’s peak is up on 2013, but down on 2012, which peaked with 1.61m (13.3%). Interestingly, because of Sky’s split programme strategy, this is the first time a programme has averaged over a million viewers on the channel (1.0017m).

With the later start time, it meant that BBC’s coverage began later, as the contract says. Last year’s highlights show averaged 3.58m on BBC One, at the more favourable early evening timeslot. This year, at 22:00 on BBC Two, the highlights averaged 2.38m (15.3%), bringing a combined audience of 3.38m, down about a million on every year from 2009 through to 2013. 2008’s race, broadcast live on ITV, averaged 3.55m (30.4%). Races moving nearer to primetime, in the case of Bahrain, is only a good thing if broadcasters exploit it. On this occasion, the BBC didn’t exploit it. For some reason, the race weekend clashed with both the Grand National on Saturday and then the Boat Race on Sunday, which meant that the chances of BBC picking Bahrain live was zero.

Qualifying
Saturday’s Qualifying session didn’t fare much better, again thanks to the scheduling issues noted above. Live coverage averaged 373k (2.8%) from 15:00 to 17:45 on Sky Sports F1, down on 2012 and 2013. A direct clash with the Grand National, which peaked with over 8 million on Channel 4, didn’t help. BBC Two’s highlights averaged 1.96m (9.8%) from 21:00 to 22:15. The combined audience of 2.33m is the lowest for the Bahrain qualifying session since the pre-BBC days. The ratings beg the question of whose idea it was to have the highlights for the North American races at that time when the contract was drawn up – was not having the race highlights at 21:00 possible?

I’m not sure whether the contract specifically says that the race cannot be screened until 22:00, but it appears to be one rule for qualifying and another for the race. This year, BBC are screening highlights of USA and Brazil, which means we will get more late night highlights. How is Formula 1 meant to build an audience as the season heads to a climax? Because screening highlights at 22:00 does not benefit anyone, and limits the audience potential. I’m expecting some to point the finger at the poor racing (in the view of many, myself not included) for Australia and Malaysia, but it is much more complex than that: poor scheduling, no ‘multi 21’ drama, good weather amongst other things, some of which have been noted in your comments in the survey that I am currently doing. If we get into the European season and viewing figures are still dropping, then I think there is real cause for concern, but not until.

GP2 Series
Last weekend, GP2’s coverage began on Sky Sports F1 for 2014 with pleasing ratings. The feature race on Saturday averaged 46k (0.7%), with the sprint race on Sunday bringing 70k (0.8%). The feature race was slightly above last year’s ratings, but the surprising rating is for the sprint race – its the highest rating for a sprint race ever on the channel. Hopefully the figures continue to improve as the season progresses.

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

Hamilton’s win not as big as “multi 21” but remains solid

With no race drama in another “multi 21” controversy up front to draw in viewers, nor plumes of snow in the United Kingdom, the Malaysian Grand Prix dropped off year-on-year, but didn’t disgrace itself.

Race
Yesterday’s live coverage on BBC One from 08:00 to 11:15 averaged 2.45m (32.7%) with Sky Sports F1’s race show, also from 08:00 bringing 574k (7.7%) to the channel. Highlights on BBC One added 1.07m (12.5%), according to unofficial overnight viewing figures, bringing the combined average to 4.09m viewers. In 2013, the race averaged 4.01m (27.1%) for the highlights show on BBC One and 908k (13.0%) from 07:00 to 10:30 on Sky Sports F1. With a combined figure of 4.92m, it means a drop of over 20 percent. However, given the controversy that surrounded last years’ race, and the British weather doing what it does best, this shouldn’t be too surprising. Does that make it a bad rating? I don’t think so, as last year was clearly a set of freak circumstances all coming together.

In 2012, perhaps a better reflection, the race averaged 2.73m (27.9%) on BBC One from 14:45 to 16:40 and about 1.03m (14.0%) on Sky Sports F1. An exact slot comparison is difficult for 2012 as the race was red flagged and overran. This brings us to a combined average of 3.76m in 2012, so 2014 is up on that. It should be noted that yesterday’s figure is down on the BBC exclusive years: 2009, 2010 and 2011. So whilst, yes its a solid rating and not a disaster, it is definitely by no means great.

Elsewhere, live coverage of the opening round of the 2014 British Touring Car Championship averaged a disappointing 192k (2.1%) on ITV4 (including +1) from 10:30 to 18:00, peaking with 278k (3.4%) at 14:20. By the championship’s standards, that is an unusually low rating, and is the lowest season opener since at least 2010. I don’t know the reasoning behind it, but in the past, BTCC races have tended to peak upwards of half a million viewers so that strikes me as low. The F1 highlights could have knocked a few hundred thousand off it, however it is a seven and a half hour show where viewers traditionally dip ‘in’ for the main BTCC races, except that clearly didn’t happen yesterday. Over on ESPN, IndyCar averaged 5k (0.01%). BT Sport haven’t promoted IndyCar once this year, so this should come as no surprise. In their view, it is simply there to fill the hours.

Qualifying
Saturday’s Qualifying session brought in the second largest ever audience for a Malaysian Qualifying session, only behind 2013, unofficial overnight viewing figures show. Extended live coverage on BBC One from 07:00 to 10:10 averaged a respectable 1.41m (24.0%). I use the word ‘respectable’ as it is not that much better than BBC One’s usual Saturday morning line-up, but it is still good for what it is. Sky Sports F1’s coverage averaged approximately 282k (4.8%), with BBC One’s afternoon highlights from 13:15 to 15:30 adding a further 850k (11.0%).

This brings the combined figure to 2.55m viewers, a far cry from the 3.17m combined average in 2013 – split 336k for Sky and 2.83m for BBC, but above every other year. In the grand scheme of things, it has to be said that 2013 is an anomaly due to the weather: the preceding years from 2009 to 2012 were all in the ~2.2m region.

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

Scheduling: The 2014 Bahrain Grand Prix

From one hot and humid country to another as Formula 1 quickly heads from Malaysia to Bahrain, which also marks the first of two night races in 2014. No matter, a night race won’t hide the fact that the race is in the desert and therefore still makes for a dull back drop. It remains to be seen whether on track activity or other political activity will be the main focus during the Grand Prix weekend, but we shall see.

If you want to jump to the schedule, click the links below:

– Thursday 3rd April
– Friday 4th April
– Saturday 5th April
– Sunday 6th April
– Wednesday 9th April
– Classic F1

BBC are screening highlights of this race, which is unsurprising considering it is near to the edge of prime time. Also, Qualifying clashes with the Grand National, which is a poor scheduling decision all around, and will definitely hurt Sky’s Qualifying rating. The side effect of Bahrain being a night race means that BBC’s programming is on BBC Two. The terms of the contract say that BBC’s highlights have to be on more than ‘X hours’ (which varies depending on timezone I think) after the live action, which is why Bahrain is on at 21:00 and 22:00 respectively, and not on BBC One as it would displace prime time programming. Due to various clashes, practice commentary on BBC Radio is consigned to online.

Returning this weekend is GP2 on Sky Sports F1, now into year three on the channel. For anyone wanting GP2’s profile to increase at all in the UK, Sky are taking the World Feed only again, so no pre and post-race coverage it seems. Will Buxton will be providing the commentary again, for 2014 he will be alongside Luca Filippi. It’s disappointing, as they should be looking at maximising what they have, especially considering the favourable timeslots this weekend. On the other hand, Sky may take the view that only one driver from GP2 or GP3 has graduated to Formula 1 for this season, so why give the series’ more air-time if it is not bringing any benefit in the long run? I’d argue that they should add Formula Renault 3.5 to the channel, but as long as the channel is named Sky Sports F1, that won’t happen, but it’s a discussion for another day.

Thursday 3rd April
13:00 to 13:45 – F1: Driver Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
20:45 to 21:00 – F1: Gear Up for Bahrain (Sky Sports F1)

Friday 4th April
10:00 to 10:50 – GP2: Practice (Sky Sports F1)
11:45 to 13:50 – F1: Practice 1 (Sky Sports F1)
15:45 to 17:55 – F1: Practice 2 (Sky Sports F1)
17:55 to 18:35 – GP2: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1 (BBC News Channel)
19:00 to 19:45 – F1: Team Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
20:00 to 21:00 – The F1 Show: Force India Special (Sky Sports F1)

Saturday 5th April
11:05 to 12:20 – GP2: Race 1 (Sky Sports F1)
12:45 to 14:10 – F1: Practice 3 (Sky Sports F1)
15:00 to 17:45 – F1: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
15:55 to 17:05 – F1: Qualifying (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1 (BBC News Channel)
21:00 to 22:15 – F1: Qualifying Highlights (BBC Two)

Sunday 6th April
12:10 to 13:10 – GP2: Race 2 (Sky Sports F1)
14:30 to 19:15 – F1: Race (Sky Sports F1)
=> 14:30 – Track Parade
=> 15:00 – Race
=> 18:30 – Paddock Live
15:45 to 18:00 – F1: Race (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
22:00 to 23:30 – F1: Race Highlights (BBC Two)

Wednesday 9th April
20:30 to 21:00 – Midweek Report (Sky Sports F1)

Classic F1 on Sky Sports F1
Another minor moan is the classic F1 scheduling. I noted before that each race is getting three outings this season (so in reality it is the same output as last year, with a few races being added to the collection and a few removed). The issue I have is the randomness of it all. From 2008 to 1982 to 2011 and then to 1993 in the week after Bahrain. Why not have a story that viewers can follow over a two week period, a complete season? Again, it’s not what they are currently doing is bad (in fact, we should applaud them for showing classic races), it’s just that they are not maximising what they have in my opinion. I wrote a post nearly two years ago with an idea, and the basis of it I feel it is valid more than ever with Sky airing one F1 race a day.

03/04 – 21:00 to 23:15 – 2013 Bahrain Grand Prix (Sky commentary)
04/04 – 13:50 to 15:00 – 1972 Season Review
04/04 – 21:00 to 23:00 – 2006 Bahrain Grand Prix
05/04 – 21:00 to 23:30 – 2010 Bahrain Grand Prix
06/04 – 13:30 to 14:30 – 1973 Season Review
06/04 – 22:30 to 23:30 – 1994 Japanese Grand Prix Highlights
07/04 – 21:00 to 21:45 – 1982 Caesars Palace Grand Prix Highlights
08/04 – 21:00 to 23:00 – 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix
09/04 – 21:00 to 23:00 – 2008 Italian Grand Prix
10/04 – 21:00 to 22:00 – 1982 Belgian Grand Prix Highlights
11/04 – 21:00 to 23:15 – 2011 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
12/04 – 21:00 to 21:45 – 1993 Monaco Grand Prix Highlights
13/04 – 21:00 to 21:45 – 1984 Austrian Grand Prix Highlights
14/04 – 21:00 to 22:45 – 2003 British Grand Prix
15/04 – 21:00 to 21:45 – 1990 Hungarian Grand Prix Highlights

If anything changes, I’ll add a note below.

Scheduling: The 2014 Malaysian Grand Prix

Whether it is noise, fuel or just, you know, the racing that gets you talking, there is plenty on the agenda as Formula 1 heads to Sepang for the Malaysian Grand Prix. The Malaysian circuit is highly regarded by Formula 1 fans, this year is its 15th anniversary on the calendar having joined in 1999. The race will be the first of nine races to be screened live on both the BBC and Sky Sports F1 this season. Before getting into the main details, the most important point for all of those in the UK is that the clocks go forward one hour in the early hours of Sunday morning. So, just be wary of that if you plan to put your alarm on. If you want to jump to the schedule, click on the links below…

– Thursday 27th March
– Friday 28th March
– Saturday 29th March
– Sunday 30th March
– Wednesday 2nd April
– Classic F1

Based on comments in Australia, I don’t believe that Eddie Jordan will be with the BBC team in Malaysia, so expect to see Allan McNish alongside Suzi Perry and David Coulthard for the build-up and post-race reaction. Over on Sky Sports F1, ahead of ‘Senna Week’ at the end of April to mark the 20th anniversary of Ayrton’s death, Bruno Senna will be making his first appearance with the team in Malaysia. I did at the time say that Bruno would be a good addition to the Sky team, nothing more, nothing less. Whilst we don’t have concrete details, I think it is fair to assume that he will be playing a significant part in the Senna programming coming up, which was probably the main reason for Sky getting him on-board in the first place.

The F1 Show from Malaysia will be a Williams special, which should be good. I assume the entire show will be from location in Malaysia, but it wouldn’t surprise me if some of it was coming from the studio in London if they are going to showcase some of the old Williams cars. As I have done in the past, again in 2014 I will include non-F1 content of my choice, in other words, if I plan to watch said motor sport, I’ll add it below. This week, the IndyCar Series is back on BT Sport, albeit on ESPN, whilst the BTCC returns to ITV4, with Steve Rider fronting the coverage and David Addison and Tim Harvey in the commentary box.

Thursday 27th March
07:00 to 07:45 – F1: Driver Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
20:30 to 21:00 – F1: Preview (BBC Radio 5 Live)
20:45 to 21:00 – F1: Gear Up for Malaysia (Sky Sports F1)

Friday 28th March
01:45 to 03:50 – F1: Practice 1 (Sky Sports F1)
01:55 to 03:35 – F1: Practice 1 (BBC Two)
05:45 to 08:00 – F1: Practice 2 (Sky Sports F1)
05:55 to 07:35 – F1: Practice 2 (BBC Two)
08:00 to 08:45 – F1: Team Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
10:00 to 11:00 – The F1 Show: Williams Special (Sky Sports F1)
18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1 (BBC News Channel)

Saturday 29th March
04:45 to 06:15 – F1: Practice 3 (Sky Sports F1)
04:55 to 06:05 – F1: Practice 3 (BBC Two)
07:00 to 09:30 – F1: Qualifying (BBC One)
07:00 to 09:45 – F1: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
13:15 to 15:30 – F1: Qualifying Replay (BBC One)
18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1 (BBC News Channel)

NOTE: Clocks go forward one hour, with the change from Greenwich Mean Time to British Summer Time. The times below are BST…

Sunday 30th March
07:30 to 12:15 – F1: Race (Sky Sports F1)
=> 07:30 – Track Parade
=> 08:00 – Race
=> 11:30 – Paddock Live
08:00 to 11:15 – F1: Race (BBC One)
10:30 to 18:00 – BTCC: Brands Hatch (ITV4)
11:15 to 12:15 – F1: Forum (BBC Red Button)
13:45 to 15:45 – F1: Race Replay (BBC One)
20:00 to 23:00 – IndyCars: St Petersburg (ESPN)

Wednesday 2nd April
20:30 to 21:00 – Midweek Report (Sky Sports F1)

Classic F1 on Sky Sports F1
An addition to the Sky Sports F1 line-up starting this week is some classic season reviews from the 1970s coming out of the Brunswick Films archive, which is really good as Sky have not shown much content from that era, their ‘GP Uncovered’ strand has tended to focus on the 1950s and 1960s, whereas of course material owned by FOM is 1980s onwards. 2001 Malaysia was included in the provisional schedule, but again failed to make the final cut, which suggests that the copy FOM has is incomplete, or without UK commentary.

27/03 – 21:00 to 23:45 – 1999 Malaysian Grand Prix
28/03 – 21:00 to 23:00 – 2002 Malaysian Grand Prix
29/03 – 09:45 to 10:45 – 1970 Season Review
29/03 – 21:00 to 23:30 – 2007 Malaysian Grand Prix
30/03 – 12:15 to 13:15 – 1971 Season Review
30/03 – 21:00 to 23:30 – 2010 Malaysian Grand Prix
31/03 – 21:00 to 21:35 – 1982 Austrian Grand Prix Highlights
01/04 – 21:00 to 23:00 – 2012 Canadian Grand Prix (Sky commentary)
02/04 – 21:00 to 00:00 – 2012 Singapore Grand Prix (Sky commentary)

As always, if anything changes I shall update this blog if necessary.