Quote:
Originally Posted by Knowlesy
I am surprised they have dropped horse racing, I thought the Beeb loved paying out for sports nobody watches like rugby?
|
Viewing figures for the 6 Nations and the F1 Championship were a similar level actually.
In 2008 for example on ITV most F1 races had a viewership of under 4 million, the only races above that were Silverstone (4.5 million) and Brazil (9 million).
In 2011 the viewing figures for the 6 Nations hit an average of 4.7 million per game. The highest of which was 9.6 million and the second highest was 8.2 million.
The 6 Nations is also a lot cheaper to produce (roughly £13 million a year less than the F1) and so are any other rugby games they may show. Its also got the advantage of being relatively quick tournament that only takes up two months of broadcasting space rather than 8. Instead of it being 16-20 events over two-thirds of the year, its 15 events over about 7 weeks.
Still believe that the F1 shouldn't have gone to Sky but the idea that no-one watches the Rugby, is a bit strange.
Apparently 11 Million people watched the National on Sunday but other than that, I doubt the BBC gets much in the way of viewing figures for horse racing (do they show much these days?). Again, its a bit of an odd decision to drop the National but they've done it before (like the F1 funnily enough) so maybe that made it easier.