NASCAR’s first road race of the year may have featured a field bolstered by a pair of Formula 1 world champions and an IMSA ace, but it still took a year-on-year hit in TV audience.
Last Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at COTA averaged a 1.81 Nielsen rating and 3.129 million household viewers on FOX, per numbers from ShowBuzzDaily.com. That is down from a 2.18/3.731m for last year’s race, and also below the previous week’s Atlanta round (1.95/3.422m).
The support series races at COTA were also down in viewers, although by smaller margins. Saturday’s Xfinity Series race averaged 0.52/815,000 on FS1 compared to 0.64/1.075m last year, while the Craftsman Truck Series race that preceded it on FS1 averaged 0.43 and 697,000 viewers vs 0.42/719K in 2022.
The NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series averaged 0.20/324,000 for coverage of its Phoenix finals Sunday evening on FS1. That’s down from last February’s Phoenix finals that aired on FS1 in the same time slot (0.24/401K).