Has Bernie not learnt anything?

[henners88]

Those of us left with just the BBC coverage find it harder to accept though Philip. It might seem good that the BBC at least kept half the races but for 85% of the F1 viewing audience in the UK, it's very watered down. You have to be very lucky to get the sky coverage here due to its extortionate monthly cost and as good as it is, not enough people are sitting down to watch it.

F1 has chosen to freeze out 4.5 million viewers in favour of a bit more money to give a product to a 600k select few. The fact it is quite a well presented product is largely lost because most f1 fans haven't a clue what is on offer. It seems like a lost market to me. To add to that, f1 has accumulatively lost 3 million viewers since this deal started. That doesn't strike me as very promising for its long term popularity.

If you've got Sky though, you don't need to care about that.

[Tazio]

The two big motorsports in the US are IndyCar and NASCAR.

Last year (I read): F1 US GP and the NASCAR finale were both on the same day - NASCAR got a lot more people attending.

Dude you are seriously tripping, and I humbly suggest you don’t know WTF you are talking about:

A capacity crowd of 117,429 watched a wild and suspenseful battle between the remaining contenders for the drivers’ title, Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull and Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso, on a track and at a site that delivered all of its promise and more.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/sport ... .html?_r=0

You do realize that capacity means that they sold every ticket for the freakin' race.
BTW the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup finale you speak of was at the Homestead Raceway in Miami Fla. which has a seating capacity of just fewer than 80,000
BTW I attended all three days at CotA last year and the place was packed.

Incidentally I was speaking to a group of Mexicans, which the race drew quite a few of at my hotel in San Marcos Texas 20 miles south of CotA, and about 30 south of Austin the day after the race, and asked them what the thought of it. They informed me that they had only stopped there for one night, as they were returning all the way to Monterey Mexico after attending The Dallas Cowboys NFL game.
You really do not have a clue about the sports scene in the US...bro.

[jens]

Leave bernie alone, he knows what he is doing!!

I think on the whole Bernie has known very well, what he has been doing, building F1 into a famous world-wide brand with lots of media coverage. But we can nitpick on small details that could be done better, since nobody is perfect and they all make mistakes, even if these are small ones.

[henners88]

Leave bernie alone, he knows what he is doing!!

I think on the whole Bernie has known very well, what he has been doing, building F1 into a famous world-wide brand with lots of media coverage. But we can nitpick on small details that could be done better, since nobody is perfect and they all make mistakes, even if these are small ones.

Bernie has helped build F1 into a global brand and of course he knows what he's doing. However, he's got greedy and sold it all off with no foresight into how this will help the future of the sport. It's earning money now, but popularity is dropping year on year and nobody seems bothered. Hopefully Bernie won't be in this position much longer and someone younger with a fresh outlook will come along and put quality before quick cash. I won't hold my breath.

[Mia 01]

I agree that someone else, younger and with fresh ideas, perhaps would be better than Bernie. That someone could be Christian Horner according rumours.

[call_me_andrew]

You must not have been paying attention since 1996. F1 is more popular than IndyCar in the U.S. now.

[tommy2k8]

I do not see how! What about NASCAR?

[Tazio]

It is all over Google again that F1 won't stand a chance against NASCAR this year

Circuit of the Americas has, for the second year running, produced a three-day weekend crowd of north of 250,000 spectators for the United States Grand Prix.

Official attendance numbers from the track were released today, with a mark of 113,162 fans in attendance on Sunday to bring the weekend total to 250,324.

http://motorsportstalk.nbcsports.com/20 ... 2-at-cota/

Not a bad size crowd considering both championships had been decided for a while, (which was the deciding factor for me not attending this year) and like last season will probably put us at #2 in attendance again this season, although that is just speculation on my part since I have not done any research into the matter.
As for NASCAR it is the most popular form of motor racing in this country, but why can't you accept the fact that we are a very diverse group of people as a whole? I never paid much attention to NASCAR until Montoya joined the field, and will probably watch next to none now that he is leaving, and I wasn't watching that much in the first place, it just really isn't my cup of meat. I am glad that Jimmie Johnson won the championship however as he grew up less than 6 miles from where I currently reside. Personally I prefer F1, Moto GP, Sports Car Racing, Drag Racing, and Motocross by leaps and bounds over NASCAR, but you have to realize that like many other Americans my Sundays also include NFL NBA Tennis, and MLB to just name a few.
Americans have vastly different tastes when it comes to entertainment and there are a lot of us. It is an exercise in futility to try to state what our preferences are as a whole. Different regions tend to have their own inclinations.

[tommy2k8]

Sorry if I upset anybody

[Tazio]

You certainly didn't upset me. I make it a point not to make comments about the specific preferences of Brits or any other country that I have not spent much time in, unless of course I am joking. I realize that this is predominantly a UK site, and members of your tribe like to speculate about life in the US, and to be honest almost all of it is true to a degree, or in a specific instance for some Americans. But life-styles, beliefs, and persuasions in this country are an extremely varied demographic, and it is a waste of time, and it is meaningless to say:
"Americans are........"
Because if you look closely enough you will find nearly as many aren’t as are!