But it was the television ratings from Talladega — one of NASCAR’s most famous tracks — that were most eye-opening. The race delivered a 2.85 national rating on Fox, with 4.7 million viewers. The same race in 2017, a week later but also on Fox, had a 3.5 rating and 5.9 million viewers.
That is an 18% drop in ratings and a 20% drop in viewership, but it gets even more grim. The 2016 race at Talladega had a 4.0 national rating, with 6.7 million viewers. So in just two years, the race lost two million of 6.7 million viewers — a 30% plunge. (The same race 10 years ago drew nine million viewers, incidentally.)
On the previous weekend, a race at Richmond drew a crowd estimated by news media at about 42,500, not bad for stands that now seat about 50,000. But there used to be 112,000 seats at Richmond, which were filled for 33 Cup races in a row through 2008.
The Richmond race had a 1.8 rating and three million viewers on Fox, down 38% in ratings and 34% in viewership from the 2017 spring race there (2.9, with 4.6 million viewers) — and down 42% in ratings and 36% in viewership from the 2016 race (3.1, with 4.7 million viewers).
The first six Cup races this year, including the Daytona 500, drew a total of 31.07 million on TV. The first six Cup races in 2016 drew 43.13 million. That is a 28% drop.
NASCAR is dead so it hardly seems to matter at this point
Indy, for its problems, is at least still a motorsport. I think I even prefer it to WEC
How so?
Also, Alonso is staying with McLaren? Seems like that relationship is pretty bad, even if it would be a different team in a different series.
Alonso's biggest problem at McLaren the first time was Ron Dennis. He's long gone now, and I think his only issue now is the lack of performance. Indy kind of addresses that.
But it was the television ratings from Talladega — one of NASCAR’s most famous tracks — that were most eye-opening. The race delivered a 2.85 national rating on Fox, with 4.7 million viewers. The same race in 2017, a week later but also on Fox, had a 3.5 rating and 5.9 million viewers.
That is an 18% drop in ratings and a 20% drop in viewership, but it gets even more grim. The 2016 race at Talladega had a 4.0 national rating, with 6.7 million viewers. So in just two years, the race lost two million of 6.7 million viewers — a 30% plunge. (The same race 10 years ago drew nine million viewers, incidentally.)
On the previous weekend, a race at Richmond drew a crowd estimated by news media at about 42,500, not bad for stands that now seat about 50,000. But there used to be 112,000 seats at Richmond, which were filled for 33 Cup races in a row through 2008.
The Richmond race had a 1.8 rating and three million viewers on Fox, down 38% in ratings and 34% in viewership from the 2017 spring race there (2.9, with 4.6 million viewers) — and down 42% in ratings and 36% in viewership from the 2016 race (3.1, with 4.7 million viewers).
The first six Cup races this year, including the Daytona 500, drew a total of 31.07 million on TV. The first six Cup races in 2016 drew 43.13 million. That is a 28% drop.
In 5 years it will barely be able to get its own youtube channel. I don't closely follow the NASCAR political drama anymore, but last I heard, the family that owns it and the corrupt holding company that owns half the tracks, is trying to put it up for sale, and the asking price was uhh... not high, considering what NASCAR was even 10 years ago. (3-5 bill, and that's including ownership of Daytona, lol)
For comparison, F1 sold for 8, and F1 is basically nothing but a sheet of paper that says "we are F1"
Probably because they know that they're not going to be able to afford to renovate them when they start falling apart again. I didn't even know about the Richmond seats thing, but that's wild. Daytona also demolished grandstands.
What killed it? Literally every decision they ever made since Dale died.
Another thing that killed it, like what has hurt attendance at all US sports, is HD TELEVISION. European sports keep their stuff behind extremely expensive television packages which means less competition.
What i think is killing NASCAR is that it tried to maintain their Good Ol' Boys of the South image, while IndyCar welcomed non-white drivers very early.
NHRA is also surprisingly diverse, and last I heard it is having no problems with attendance.
Racism does not sell anymore, and it may be too late for NASCAR to change and save the series. They are trying hard with their token black driver, though.
At least short track oval racing is still popular around here.
What i think is killing NASCAR is that it tried to maintain their Good Ol' Boys of the South image, while IndyCar welcomed non-white drivers very early.
NHRA is also surprisingly diverse, and last I heard it is having no problems with attendance.
Racism does not sell anymore, and it may be too late for NASCAR to change and save the series. They are trying hard with their token black driver, though.
At least short track oval racing is still popular around here.
When the Texas Motor Speedway up in Ft. Worth opened back in the 90's, my dad and I got season tickets. Went to all the races there (NASCAR, IndyCar, etc) for a few years. It was great. Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, the Labonte brothers (Texas boys!). We had tons of fun!
I haven't been since college though. And NASCAR just doesn't interest me that much any more. The racing can still be pretty good... they have lots of lead changes and cars moving around the pack... a lot of times I'd say it more racing than F1, which can frequently end up being mostly driving. But how hard they've leaned into the good ol' boy thing is definitely a turnoff for me, and I still live in freaking Texas and still go hunting & fishing pretty regularly and drive a Chevy pickup! I am a good ol' boy (granted with left-leaning progressive political ideology and philosophy), and NASCAR is just too much for me.
I know Sainz can't say "well shit, guess I'm probably going to be fighting lower down the order, but it was either that or leave F1", but I do wonder if that's what he's thinking...
Still, glad he at least landed a drive. He deserves to stay in F1.
I know Sainz can't say "well shit, guess I'm probably going to be fighting lower down the order, but it was either that or leave F1", but I do wonder if that's what he's thinking...
Still, glad he at least landed a drive. He deserves to stay in F1.
McLaren could potentially recover, as Renault are pushing to the front of the midfield and maybe even better, so if Sainz is super lucky, this might be a lateral move in the standings, but even as someone who has been cheering for McLaren the whole time I've been watching (Only 3 years) and they've been losing ground all three years, I don't expect it.
It's a pity to see Alonso go when he was still one of the best drivers on the grid but I can't blame him given the situation at McLaren. Sainz is a decent replacement and probably the best McLaren could get but, barring a significant improvement in performance, they'll be missing the points Alonso could regularly bring in. The team in general are just a mess at the minute and look doomed to become "the next Williams" unless they can turn it around soon.
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I think cheering for Ricciardo in a Renault is a super easy choice.
Like, what's not to like? Works team underdog with one of the best drivers on the grid who is also a class act?
I think cheering for Ricciardo in a Renault is a super easy choice.
Like, what's not to like? Works team underdog with one of the best drivers on the grid who is also a class act?
I'm down.
To elaborate slightly (imo):
Works team underdog with the two drivers who would easily top my "have a couple of beers and shoot the shit with" list, both class acts, at least one of whom is known to be one of the best drivers on the grid and the other one is bloody good too (very, very often picking up that "best of the rest" spot). As such I'm looking forward to seeing how they stack up against each other in the same car. Which I really hope is a good one.
I know Sainz can't say "well shit, guess I'm probably going to be fighting lower down the order, but it was either that or leave F1", but I do wonder if that's what he's thinking...
Still, glad he at least landed a drive. He deserves to stay in F1.
McLaren could potentially recover
Absolutely not. Have you seen that behind the scenes Amazon series on them? Wewwwww lad
I know Sainz can't say "well shit, guess I'm probably going to be fighting lower down the order, but it was either that or leave F1", but I do wonder if that's what he's thinking...
Still, glad he at least landed a drive. He deserves to stay in F1.
McLaren could potentially recover
Absolutely not. Have you seen that behind the scenes Amazon series on them? Wewwwww lad
I only have a 360 controller so Forza is the best I feel comfortable doing, but once I get a wheel I will try iRacing.
Verstappen and Gasly. A match made in middle-of-the-pack heaven.
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I was subscribed to iRacing for a year and hardly played it at all.
So, here's the thing: The best time I've had with online multiplayer, bar none, was the PA car club on XBox 360 racing Forza 4. That was a baller time.
My XBox packed it in, I decided no more consoles, and wanted to having a similar experience on PC, but found none.
My friend is a huge iRacing fan and got me to subscribe. The first thing that turned me off was the money. iRacing is crazy expensive. Monthly fee, having to buy individual cars and tracks, you can easily spend thousands just to get something like Forza.
But that's not the draw. The racing community is the draw of iRacing.
But you need to get your license. I just wanted to race with friends. But iRacing doesn't allow that until I spend the time to graduate my license high enough to participate in the same races.
OR
You can spend MORE money and rent server time to host your own races.
So all that time, and I never once raced with my friends. I spent a few weeks trying to get out of Rookie, and gave up because I didn't enjoy it at all. And the community were assholes because I was stuck in rookie and the people in rookie are the people dive bombing others, and generally being douchenozzles.
So I just gave it up.
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I think iRacing is great if you don't care about racing with a group, or friends, and are fine with every single racing being a group of randos. But randos is why I don't play online games. I don't want to play with random people, I want to play with my friends.
Forza is on PC now, in both Motorsport and Horizon forms. Only through the MS Store, of course, but still.
I would love to get a group of PAers together for some F1 races in the Codies' games, but there's so few people who play them scattered over the three platforms and the various annual iterations of the game (I don't know anyone else on here that picks it up every year) that it just seems doomed. F1 2015 was free on PC a couple of times, so that has a larger ownership on Steam than the others, but thus far nothing's happened there.
Forza is on PC now, in both Motorsport and Horizon forms. Only through the MS Store, of course, but still.
I would love to get a group of PAers together for some F1 races in the Codies' games, but there's so few people who play them scattered over the three platforms and the various annual iterations of the game (I don't know anyone else on here that picks it up every year) that it just seems doomed. F1 2015 was free on PC a couple of times, so that has a larger ownership on Steam than the others, but thus far nothing's happened there.
I've been waiting for them to do a VR release, but if a few people here pick up F1 2018, I'd be down, VR or no.
I need to get a new wheel, though. My Logitech wheel packed it in.
Jenson Button thinks Alonso could be back in F1 in 2020, if McLaren can offer him a car capable of winning races.
The wording of Alonso's announcement did look like he was (sensibly) keeping his options open. It's a huge "if" to be workng with, but it could happen. Remember when Prost took a year off, then came back and won the championship again, and then promptly retired (so he didn't end up teammates with Senna again)? Although, that year off was kind of an unintentional mistake as he left himself with nowhere to go in 1992 after falling out with Ferrari. But still.
So, here's the thing: The best time I've had with online multiplayer, bar none, was the PA car club on XBox 360 racing Forza 4. That was a baller time.
I miss those Forza days! We always managed really good attendance for those, and had some awesome races. I still think back fondly of my Orange Crush van.
I wish I had the PC to play F1 with y’all, but for now I am limited to an under powered laptop and a PS4.
Thursday night is still the primary race night with 7 to 10 on regularly. Because I work nights and have saturday's off I try and do some racing on Saturday nights too, but Summer tends to make getting together on Saturday nights much more difficult.
Force India is now Racing Point Force India. Bit of a mouthful, but at least the team survives. Legally it's a new entity, however, and due to objections by at least one other team (one of McLaren, Williams and Renault), they do not retain rights to prize money. Also, as legally a new team, they start over from zero points - I assume (though have yet to confirm) just in the constructor's championship.
Lando Norris (I do idly wonder if his parents are Star Wars fans?) impressed in FP1 in Belgium, driving Alonso's McLaren, firmly putting Vandoorne in the shade. The question doesn't seem to be if we'll see him get an F1 drive, but when - next year, or will they keep him in F2 for one more year? Silly season is still shaking itself out.
In other news, I've only just seen Robert Wickens' crash in Indy at Pocono. Fingers crossed he makes a full recovery, because that was a truly horrifying crash. Ryan Hunter-Reay had a very lucky escape in that one too.
Force India is now Racing Point Force India. Bit of a mouthful, but at least the team survives. Legally it's a new entity, however, and due to objections by at least one other team (one of McLaren, Williams and Renault), they do not retain rights to prize money. Also, as legally a new team, they start over from zero points - I assume (though have yet to confirm) just in the constructor's championship.
Lando Norris (I do idly wonder if his parents are Star Wars fans?) impressed in FP1 in Belgium, driving Alonso's McLaren, firmly putting Vandoorne in the shade. The question doesn't seem to be if we'll see him get an F1 drive, but when - next year, or will they keep him in F2 for one more year? Silly season is still shaking itself out.
In other news, I've only just seen Robert Wickens' crash in Indy at Pocono. Fingers crossed he makes a full recovery, because that was a truly horrifying crash. Ryan Hunter-Reay had a very lucky escape in that one too.
From news today it sounds like they will actually retain the prize money that goes to teams that have competed for multiple seasons in a row, and will get constructor's championship money, but only based on their CC points from Spa onward.
The more that comes out the more it seems likely it will be a miracle if Wickens makes a "full recovery."
Honestly IndyCar is extremely lucky that things weren't worse because we were about 6 inches from RHR being decapitated. And it doesn't seem like too many people are really talking about that and what should be done to prevent it.
Yeah... regarding Wickens, it is hope rather than expectation.
Also in hope against expectation, Indy just got yet another big wake-up call. They need head protection arguably even more than F1 does, given the nature of what they do, and those fences need modifying. They've been umm-ing and aah-ing about that since Dan Wheldon died seven goddamn years ago and still haven't done anything about it.
Good to hear that about FI. It's a shame they're starting from scratch but they certainly have the opportunity to rack up a semi-decent score by the end of the season if luck stays with them.
A very lucky escape for Vandoorne in FP3. Could have easily ended up in catch fencing on one of the fastest parts of the track; Karun Chandhok on C4 did compare it to Wickens' crash.
And now Gasly embarrassed himself spinning out of the pitlane. Oops.
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Indy, for its problems, is at least still a motorsport. I think I even prefer it to WEC
How so?
Also, Alonso is staying with McLaren? Seems like that relationship is pretty bad, even if it would be a different team in a different series.
Ratings have been dropping steadily for most the last decade, and have just went over a cliff in the last couple of years.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davecaldwell/2018/05/02/stock-car-fans-continue-racing-away-from-nascar/
Alonso's biggest problem at McLaren the first time was Ron Dennis. He's long gone now, and I think his only issue now is the lack of performance. Indy kind of addresses that.
Steam | XBL
In 5 years it will barely be able to get its own youtube channel. I don't closely follow the NASCAR political drama anymore, but last I heard, the family that owns it and the corrupt holding company that owns half the tracks, is trying to put it up for sale, and the asking price was uhh... not high, considering what NASCAR was even 10 years ago. (3-5 bill, and that's including ownership of Daytona, lol)
For comparison, F1 sold for 8, and F1 is basically nothing but a sheet of paper that says "we are F1"
Probably because they know that they're not going to be able to afford to renovate them when they start falling apart again. I didn't even know about the Richmond seats thing, but that's wild. Daytona also demolished grandstands.
What killed it? Literally every decision they ever made since Dale died.
they've been making the worst possible choice when presented with two or more options as long as i can remember.
NHRA is also surprisingly diverse, and last I heard it is having no problems with attendance.
Racism does not sell anymore, and it may be too late for NASCAR to change and save the series. They are trying hard with their token black driver, though.
At least short track oval racing is still popular around here.
When the Texas Motor Speedway up in Ft. Worth opened back in the 90's, my dad and I got season tickets. Went to all the races there (NASCAR, IndyCar, etc) for a few years. It was great. Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, the Labonte brothers (Texas boys!). We had tons of fun!
I haven't been since college though. And NASCAR just doesn't interest me that much any more. The racing can still be pretty good... they have lots of lead changes and cars moving around the pack... a lot of times I'd say it more racing than F1, which can frequently end up being mostly driving. But how hard they've leaned into the good ol' boy thing is definitely a turnoff for me, and I still live in freaking Texas and still go hunting & fishing pretty regularly and drive a Chevy pickup! I am a good ol' boy (granted with left-leaning progressive political ideology and philosophy), and NASCAR is just too much for me.
Still, glad he at least landed a drive. He deserves to stay in F1.
Steam | XBL
McLaren could potentially recover, as Renault are pushing to the front of the midfield and maybe even better, so if Sainz is super lucky, this might be a lateral move in the standings, but even as someone who has been cheering for McLaren the whole time I've been watching (Only 3 years) and they've been losing ground all three years, I don't expect it.
Like, what's not to like? Works team underdog with one of the best drivers on the grid who is also a class act?
I'm down.
Works team underdog with the two drivers who would easily top my "have a couple of beers and shoot the shit with" list, both class acts, at least one of whom is known to be one of the best drivers on the grid and the other one is bloody good too (very, very often picking up that "best of the rest" spot). As such I'm looking forward to seeing how they stack up against each other in the same car. Which I really hope is a good one.
Steam | XBL
Absolutely not. Have you seen that behind the scenes Amazon series on them? Wewwwww lad
That organization is dead
Steam | XBL
It's basically a love letter to the game and really makes me want to play it.
Guess I can race the Lotus72D in Assetto Corsa meanwhile? :P
A man can dream.
but anyway, Gasly gets promoted to Red Bull officially, to be the also-ran
Verstappen and Gasly. A match made in middle-of-the-pack heaven.
So, here's the thing: The best time I've had with online multiplayer, bar none, was the PA car club on XBox 360 racing Forza 4. That was a baller time.
My XBox packed it in, I decided no more consoles, and wanted to having a similar experience on PC, but found none.
My friend is a huge iRacing fan and got me to subscribe. The first thing that turned me off was the money. iRacing is crazy expensive. Monthly fee, having to buy individual cars and tracks, you can easily spend thousands just to get something like Forza.
But that's not the draw. The racing community is the draw of iRacing.
But you need to get your license. I just wanted to race with friends. But iRacing doesn't allow that until I spend the time to graduate my license high enough to participate in the same races.
OR
You can spend MORE money and rent server time to host your own races.
So all that time, and I never once raced with my friends. I spent a few weeks trying to get out of Rookie, and gave up because I didn't enjoy it at all. And the community were assholes because I was stuck in rookie and the people in rookie are the people dive bombing others, and generally being douchenozzles.
So I just gave it up.
And that costs $infinite dollars in iRacing.
I would love to get a group of PAers together for some F1 races in the Codies' games, but there's so few people who play them scattered over the three platforms and the various annual iterations of the game (I don't know anyone else on here that picks it up every year) that it just seems doomed. F1 2015 was free on PC a couple of times, so that has a larger ownership on Steam than the others, but thus far nothing's happened there.
Steam | XBL
I've been waiting for them to do a VR release, but if a few people here pick up F1 2018, I'd be down, VR or no.
I need to get a new wheel, though. My Logitech wheel packed it in.
The wording of Alonso's announcement did look like he was (sensibly) keeping his options open. It's a huge "if" to be workng with, but it could happen. Remember when Prost took a year off, then came back and won the championship again, and then promptly retired (so he didn't end up teammates with Senna again)? Although, that year off was kind of an unintentional mistake as he left himself with nowhere to go in 1992 after falling out with Ferrari. But still.
Steam | XBL
But the cars and the Sim model is so good. Infinite challenge
I enjoy just doing setups and trying to set pb's
I miss those Forza days! We always managed really good attendance for those, and had some awesome races. I still think back fondly of my Orange Crush van.
I wish I had the PC to play F1 with y’all, but for now I am limited to an under powered laptop and a PS4.
Thursday night is still the primary race night with 7 to 10 on regularly. Because I work nights and have saturday's off I try and do some racing on Saturday nights too, but Summer tends to make getting together on Saturday nights much more difficult.
Lando Norris (I do idly wonder if his parents are Star Wars fans?) impressed in FP1 in Belgium, driving Alonso's McLaren, firmly putting Vandoorne in the shade. The question doesn't seem to be if we'll see him get an F1 drive, but when - next year, or will they keep him in F2 for one more year? Silly season is still shaking itself out.
In other news, I've only just seen Robert Wickens' crash in Indy at Pocono. Fingers crossed he makes a full recovery, because that was a truly horrifying crash. Ryan Hunter-Reay had a very lucky escape in that one too.
Steam | XBL
From news today it sounds like they will actually retain the prize money that goes to teams that have competed for multiple seasons in a row, and will get constructor's championship money, but only based on their CC points from Spa onward.
The more that comes out the more it seems likely it will be a miracle if Wickens makes a "full recovery."
Honestly IndyCar is extremely lucky that things weren't worse because we were about 6 inches from RHR being decapitated. And it doesn't seem like too many people are really talking about that and what should be done to prevent it.
Also in hope against expectation, Indy just got yet another big wake-up call. They need head protection arguably even more than F1 does, given the nature of what they do, and those fences need modifying. They've been umm-ing and aah-ing about that since Dan Wheldon died seven goddamn years ago and still haven't done anything about it.
Good to hear that about FI. It's a shame they're starting from scratch but they certainly have the opportunity to rack up a semi-decent score by the end of the season if luck stays with them.
Steam | XBL
And now Gasly embarrassed himself spinning out of the pitlane. Oops.
Steam | XBL