One week after a record-low Daytona 500, NASCAR ratings hit a 20-year low at Atlanta.
Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race from Atlanta earned a 3.1 rating and 5.07 million viewers on FOX, down 6% in ratings and 10% in viewership from last year (3.3, 5.61M) and down 18% and 23% respectively from 2017 (3.8, 6.60M).
Excluding rainouts, Brad Keselowski‘s win ranks as the lowest rated Atlanta race since 1999 (2.6) and the least-watched since 2003 (4.73M). The 1999 race aired on ESPN in November and the 2003 race on NBC in October.
Just four years ago, the race had a 5.6 and 9.5 million. Ratings and viewership have declined in each subsequent year.
In addition, the race was the lowest rated and least-watched on the weekend after the Daytona 500 in at least 20 years. The post-Daytona race is typically the highest rated of the NASCAR season, outside of Daytona itself. A decade ago, when the Auto Club 500 had the post-Daytona slot, it had a 6.0 and 10.2 million.
Despite the lower numbers, NASCAR was still the weekend’s top sporting event on any network, comfortably ahead of the second-place Rockets-Warriors NBA game on ABC Saturday night (2.1, 3.42M). The NBA game had a slightly higher rating in adults 18-49.
[Numbers from Nielsen via ShowBuzz Daily 2.26]
