Opposite to the continuing claims that F1 is booming like by no means earlier than, TV viewing figures for 2022 truly present a drop in comparison with the earlier season.
Yearly since Liberty Media took management of F1, across the begin of the season they’ve issued a press launch citing the earlier 12 months’s TV figures.
Nonetheless, no such launch was issued this 12 months.
Certainly, in its Fourth Quarter and Yr Finish Monetary Outcomes, issued on 1 March, Liberty refers to “Cumulative TV viewers of 1.54 billion in 2022”.
Within the launch it lists numerous different metrics – attendance, social media followers and cumulative TV viewership within the US – proudly declaring that each one have been up, whereas it merely states that the determine for the cumulative TV viewers (i.e. the worldwide viewers) final 12 months, omitting to say whether or not it was up or down. (link)
Checking the identical metric from the earlier 12 months and lo-and-behold the determine is down. OK, solely barely at 0.01 billion (1.55 billion viewers in 2021 in comparison with 1.54 billion viewers in 2022) however however it has nonetheless gone within the unsuitable route.
The essential level being that curiosity in F1 didn’t skyrocket final 12 months because it did in 2021, as Liberty would have us imagine. (link)
Whereas one can perceive Liberty’s reluctance to confess that viewer numbers have declined, there stays that query of why fewer folks watched final season.
Pitpass is conscious of plenty of followers who stopped watching following the controversial finish to the 2021 season, nevertheless there’s additionally the query of Drive to Survive, the instrument, based on most insiders, and Liberty itself, that has pushed the current increase.
Reality is, Drive to Survive presents F1 as being dramatic and having pleasure round each nook, however Christian and Toto’s spats apart, what do these new followers discover once they tune in to races? The identical group profitable each Grand Prix.
Consequently is it any shock that the TV viewers goes down. Certainly, it has even fallen in Liberty’s beloved US market.
Adam Stern, of Sports activities Enterprise Journal, stories that within the US, for the season opener in Bahrain ESPN had 1.318 million viewers, in comparison with 1.353 million in 2022. “Fox TV obtained 3.991 million viewers for (that very same) Sunday’s NASCAR race, down from 4.544 million final 12 months,” he provides, whereas “NBC obtained 1.189 million for (that) Sunday’s IndyCar opener, down from 1.405M final 12 months.”
For the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, ESPN had 1.523 million viewers, based on Stern, up on final 12 months’s 1.445 million. On the similar time Fox had 3.422 million viewers for Sunday’s NASCAR race at new Atlanta, down from 4.003 million viewers final 12 months.
Provided that the finances cap and the rules are locked in till 2026 one can safely say that Purple Bull goes to be dominant throughout that point, consequently if Drive to Survive continues to current F1 as a continuous, drama-fuelled spectacle, these new viewers are going to proceed turning off once they tune in and see the type of procession witnessed on Sunday.
Certainly, such is the priority at F1 Towers that there’s already discuss of regulation adjustments, with some believing that the FIA overreacted in its choice to lift the automotive flooring.
Some imagine this has truly taken the game within the unsuitable route and is now truly compromising overtaking once more.
Nonetheless, the complaints from the groups over spending apart, any change to the rules must be on security grounds and up to now security hasn’t been a problem.
In consequence, as we see designers introducing all method of ‘additions’ within the type of wings and slots – precisely the type of costly, fanciful structure the game was in search of to maneuver away from – there’s discuss of a must take extra benefit of (groan) DRS, presumably by growing the variety of zones and lengthening them.
What subsequent, reverse grids?
