So much for a twelve rating. Sunday’s Daytona 500 fell 10.6 percent from an 11.3 in 2006 to a 10.1 in 2007. The race still drew the fifth-highest Daytona 500 rating ever, but a fairly substantial drop for the marquee NASCAR event is still ominous.
Coming off of a year that saw several races drop in ratings and attendance, the last thing NASCAR needed was for one of the more exciting Daytona 500 races to end up with a double-digit drop. Compared to other sports, the 10.1 was higher than five of the six 2006 NBA Finals games, but outdrew only one 2006 World Series game (games 3, 4 and 5 of the ’06 World Series drew a 10.2, 10.4 and 10.3 rating respectively).
NASCAR can still claim that it tied the World Series average and beat the NBA Finals and The Masters, but there is no question that this may signal the start of a downturn in popularity. Luckily, ESPN is there to stop the potential bleeding; if the first half on FOX is down, the second half of the season on ESPN/ABC will certainly best the numbers NBC put up last year.
