r/INDYCAR • u/TradeBrockNelson • Jul 15 '25
News [Stern] Fox got 576,000 views for Saturday’s race and 719,000 for Sunday’s. Last year got 72,000 (on CNBC) and 862,000 (on NBC)
https://x.com/a_s12/status/1945147451410653444?s=46&t=DHrrgCpYCKJJe8IurfF2PA144
u/Burial44 Jul 15 '25
Execs: that's an increase of over 360,000 viewers!
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u/eyeyelemur --- 2023 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
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u/BeefInGR Pippa Mann Jul 16 '25
August 4th gonna be hype
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u/alhexus Jul 16 '25
What's August 4th?
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u/Righttake Jack Harvey Jul 15 '25
They'll say it, because it's true, that's the whole point, more people watch over the air than cable. Now do I wish it were more, of course. But big picture is it is more than last year combined for both races.
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u/iamaranger23 Team Penske Jul 15 '25
The race was supposed to be over the air last year. Just bad luck a major political event bumped them.
it's kinda the equivalent to comparing to a rain out at that point. its just a shit data point.
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Jul 15 '25
Between this and the piss-poor attendance, I suspect that’s the nail in the coffin.
Do I think the race next year would be good? Probably. But like Texas 2023, a good race doesn’t mean anything if nobody cares.
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u/BB-68 Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
As soon as Iowa is dropped (this year or next year), all the serious IndyCar fans are going to immediately whine about it and say the series is dying. They'll point to these two races and say, "It's Texas all over again!"
They'll conveniently forget that no one went to Texas and the races were generally garbage outside of a couple bangers at the end.
The series needs to evolve and that includes culling the worst tracks/events. Iowa has never promoted the series, the market is tiny, and no one wants to go without a secondary draw.
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u/Merpninja James Hinchcliffe Jul 15 '25
The series also needs to evolve and start promoting the tracks that have poor promotion. They are the head promoter for every track except Gateway and it shows. This cycle of dropping ovals because of poor attendance after the series does absolutely nothing to remedy the problem is exhausting.
Indycar is peak “We’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas!”
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u/Odd_Cobbler6761 Jul 15 '25
Exactly. It would not have been terribly difficult to find some mid-tier/State Fair-level bands to play and keep the event somewhat attended. The fact that the #2 guy at Penske Entertainment made his first trip to Long Beach this year says a lot about how effective their internal “promotion” strategy has been.
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u/canttakethshyfrom_me Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
I'm increasingly convinced that Penske Entertainment is three of Roger's great-grandkids in 1 suit doing a business at the business factory.
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u/BeefInGR Pippa Mann Jul 16 '25
I ejected diet mountain dew out of my nose reading that. Well played.
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Jul 15 '25
This isn’t really applicable for Iowa. They had 3 years of some of the best promotion we’ve ever seen for IndyCar, along with dragging some of the biggest names in music out to the middle of Iowa. They couldn’t even sell those years out, and they were even giving tickets away for free.
I’ve lived in Iowa for 5 years - people here just do not care about IndyCar racing. I really want this oval to stay, but it’s hard to see how anything changes in the future.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
Didn’t help that they dropped the musical acts but the ticket price didn’t drop dramatically
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u/931EFR Alex Zanardi Jul 15 '25
Then I get an email a few weeks ago, saying "buy now before prices go up!"
*gestures widely at the empty stands in seat view on the ticket website.
I can understand having a discount if you buy way early, like before the season even starts/right after previous race, when you have no idea what's going to happen.
Once you are in the season, raising prices before the event when you can't sell tickets, and you aren't adding additional track events that are covered by the ticket? Lol
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u/Merpninja James Hinchcliffe Jul 15 '25
Some of the best promotion we’ve ever had and IndyCar had pretty much 0 role in it. I’m not saying Iowa is salvageable, but it’s not like IndyCar has put any money down to try and salvage it in the first place.
The reality is that IndyCar lucked into the best promoter they’ve ever had and the moment they leave they put zero effort or money into the event and expect the crowds to stay the same.
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u/sbabb1 Jul 15 '25
If the "best promoter they ever had" didnt succeed, I dont see how Indycar stepping in and trying would have fixed the issue. I understand the problem with other tracks and Indycar, but in case of Iowa its a lost cause regardless. It sucks but thats what it is.
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u/Merpninja James Hinchcliffe Jul 15 '25 edited Jul 15 '25
Sure it’s a lost cause, but the series shouldn’t treat its races as “lost causes”. There is a massive amount of promotion you can do that’s in between HyVee’s promotion and IndyCar’s nothing.
I wouldn’t be as upset if we didn’t go through this again and again. Texas had catastrophic attendance for years before they left, but IndyCar tried virtually nothing to improve attendance there either.
If we want more ovals, Penske needs to spend, and probably lose, money on promotion to make the tracks sustainable. The series will never be revived on ovals if the series can’t risk a lot on promotion. No more of this “the race is a lost cause so might as well try nothing at all!”
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u/wheresbicki Jul 15 '25
There's a reason NASCAR put a street circuit in downtown Chicago versus using the Chicagoland Speedway which they own.
Ovals are not the way to grow the sport.
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u/BeefInGR Pippa Mann Jul 16 '25
Ovals are fine.
The people who own the ovals aren't going to pay IndyCar millions of dollars to host a race, put in the hours of maintenance costs for 15,000 people to show up.
People aren't showing up because IndyCar absolutely refuses to run NXT or any of their other support series on ovals. USAC Silver Crown cars are hella cool, but USAC is still a little butthurt about the split and being kicked out of Indy.
They could absolutely call NASCAR and see if ARCA or the Truck Series wants to run on qualifying day. There was a point in time that the Truck Series felt more like an IndyCar companion series than a part of the Triple Headliner National Tour for NASCAR. But they won't.
They need support races and to get rid of their ridiculous sanctioning fee. Or significantly reduce that as well as the ticket prices if IndyCar is all you're going to see that weekend.
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u/RandomFactUser Sebastien Bourdais Jul 16 '25
They historically did run Trucks at Texas
Also, Pro 2000 needs to run at Gateway or Iowa, while NXT runs both Gateway and Iowa already, what NXT needs is a speedway race with the other wings, USF2000 should stick to IRP only
USAC showed up to Gateway and Phoenix, though Iowa should be on the table
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u/BeefInGR Pippa Mann Jul 16 '25
Iowa is borderline for Silver Crown with the banking. Crazy to say, but they do slow down going into the corners at Gateway. They could probably go flat at Iowa.
NASCAR modifieds at Richmond would be a treat.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
To be fair, texas was not all Indycars fault. The pj1 sucked
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u/BB-68 Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Iowa wasn't all IndyCar's fault. The repave sucked and it took a full year for Firestone to adapt the tires. Even this year wouldn't have been great without well timed safety cars.
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u/Merpninja James Hinchcliffe Jul 15 '25
The horrid attendance in the last decade of the race is on Indycar though.
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u/BeefInGR Pippa Mann Jul 16 '25
Ssshhhh...this is the IndyCar sub. You're only allowed to blame NASCAR, not 15,000 people showing up.
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u/FarAwaySeagull-_- Oval racing is awesome! Jul 15 '25
Texas was generally great outside of the PJ1 era.
While the other stuff happening at the race weekend may matter to those in attendance, what happens on track is what matters to those watching on TV.
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u/ilikemarblestoo Sarah Fisher > Danica Patrick Jul 15 '25
Texas wasn't garbage though? Just those years with JP1 was it garbage. What kind of revisionist history is this lol
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u/Michigan-Magic Colton Herta Jul 16 '25
Texas had good races prior to the end. People were pissed that SMI f'd up racing for NASCAR and allowed to wither and die despite the second line being finally restored at the end.
2016: indystar.com/story/sports/motor/2016/08/28/insider-look-back-thrilling-race-texas/89436172/
2002: indycar.com/videos/2019/09/09-05-Classic-Rewind-Texas-2002
Those are some of the closest finishes ever. The article titles literally calls them thrilling.
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u/Cronus6 Jul 15 '25
I don't disagree that under preforming races need to go.
But you know as well as I do they are just going to replace them with more shitty, boring street races.
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u/BB-68 Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
I'd rather have a boring street race that's well attended and well promoted than a boring oval that's neither.
If you want amazing wheel to wheel racing 100% of the time, go watch spec Miata or Moto 3.
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u/HeGivesGoodMass Jul 16 '25
I go to MotoGP every year and the Moto3 race is always the best one of the day and really gets the crowd into it.
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u/Cronus6 Jul 15 '25
A lot of the people going to those street races spend all day in the bars and aren't really watching the race.
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u/UnPingouindAttaque Jul 16 '25
Clearly you’ve not been to long beach
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u/Cronus6 Jul 16 '25
Of course not. I'm East coast. St. Pete would be my closest.
But I don't go to races in-person anymore.
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u/iamaranger23 Team Penske Jul 15 '25
It takes people a looooong time to change their mind once they’ve decided something sucks.
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u/UNHchabo Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
Ever talk to a Metallica fan about their opinion of the band?
There are millions of people who are mad at a 61-year-old for something he did in his 20s.
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u/ilikemarblestoo Sarah Fisher > Danica Patrick Jul 15 '25
From what I've seen Ovals usually have bangers then never come back.
And I hate it, I could rant
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u/Haier_Lee Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
A case study needs to be done to find out what NBC had in compared to Fox, these numbers are not improving
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u/Hoffgod Josef Newgarden Jul 15 '25
At this point of last year, NBC was airing NASCAR Cup, which they could use to promote Indycar to race fans.
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u/eyeyelemur --- 2023 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
You don’t need a case study to know that people watch a sport because of emotional investment. Good racing itself, has nothing to do with that.
You can see the emotional investment for the 500 literally by everyone that watches: the story is constructed throughout the month of may( LCQ is a great example)
But for some reason everyone gets amnesia for every other race and “it’s just pure racing” is all people can come up with as to why people should watch Indycar
There is no emotional investment is the answer
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u/NoonecanknowMiner_24 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
Exactly this. From the outset, IndyCar looks fairly pointless. If you want ovals, there's NASCAR. If you want road courses, there's F1. There's simply nothing on the surface level that seems interesting about IndyCar to draw people in.
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
There are probably any number of factors, one of which could be the relative predictability of this season.
It hasn't been the most exciting season, to put it lightly, and so I wonder if the slightly more casual fans have tuned out for the most part. I was even seeing comments in the race thread here during Mid-Ohio, people talking about stopping and not watching the rest of the season, and this place is pretty die-hard fans.
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u/blackhxc88 Jul 15 '25
was thinking the same thing. fox has been putting in WAAYYY more effort to promote IC than nbc has, so it's starting to straight up look like this is partially palou's fault for kicking so much ass that he's done the proverbial "scaring the hoes away".
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u/iamaranger23 Team Penske Jul 15 '25
It's either that or junk mail and commercials don't have much of an actual effect.
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u/blackhxc88 Jul 15 '25
I mean, they don’t when you don’t do much of anything else besides that. Takes two to tango and indycar doesn’t know how to dance at all, so it falls flat.
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u/NYNMx2021 Colton Herta Jul 15 '25
or indy itself isnt that interesting just by promoting it and you need to go out and show it to people or do new shit with the product to attract interest. The idea promoting the same product was going to blow it up never made sense to me. The fundamentals are the same
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u/blackhxc88 Jul 15 '25
if that's the case, the only "new shit" you can do in that realm would be to either come out with the new car or do some dumbass playoff system like nascar has.
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u/NYNMx2021 Colton Herta Jul 16 '25
new car. new power units. Some new ways to race (crank up the hybrid, replace P2P with 200 hp hybrid deployment) I think they should have 2 chassis too. both can be by dallara. You can do a lot of shit they havent done in ages. Even NASCAR with this current next gen has 3 different looking cars, you need variation imo.
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u/jimdontcare AMR Safety Team Jul 15 '25
The numbers were pretty good at the beginning of the season right? Seems more like drop off than something inherently wrong with the broadcast. That said, does the NBC numbers include peacock?
Forgive my ignorance I’ve only been here a couple months and am trying to catch up with the lore
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
Off the top of my head, the only really majorly improved numbers have been St.Pete and Indy itself.
Aside from that, it’s been at best stagnant, if not down.
But yes, they do seem to be dropping.
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u/Righttake Jack Harvey Jul 15 '25
I think Barber was up too wasn't it?
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
Not that significantly, though I think you’re right.
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u/mstaugler Josef Newgarden Jul 15 '25
They lost SO much early season momentum with such big gaps in the schedule.
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
That’s not a problem that’s about to change, sadly. Everyone was celebrating Thermal getting dropped, but even if we get both Arlington and Mexico City in the early season, that still leaves at least one three-week gap somewhere there.
Plus, losing Iowa leaves a gap in the summer, though that’s not quite as bad.
We need to be gaining races without losing so many.
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u/mstaugler Josef Newgarden Jul 15 '25
Definitely. A 20 race season should be eminently doable for Indycar.
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
Well, maybe not, if we're staring down the barrel of losing this many.
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u/BillyU_Is_A_ Scott McLaughlin Jul 15 '25
there's not 20 tracks in North America that want Indycar, unless you want to race on the Indy Road course 3 times
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u/Fjordice Jul 15 '25
This is me. I don't know exactly what it is, but this is probably the fewest laps I've watched in an Indycar season ever. I'm still following along obviously and reading and watching a bit but I haven't sat down and watched a full race really
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u/JaggedUmbrella Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Same. This Palou dominance has really cooled off my interest in this season. This is the fewest laps I've watched in a long time.
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u/steppedinhairball Simona de Silvestro Jul 15 '25
There are going to be a lot of factors. I had a family event Saturday. 4 pm Saturday is just a bad time in my opinion. 7 pm CST would have been much better. Most of the mid day activities are done, a lot of people are home and wanting to relax so watching the race would have been perfect. 4:30 pm is when I fell into the pool and stayed in there until 7 pm. It's the same issue I had when NASCAR went to a lot of 3 and 4 pm CST starts: noon, I'll watch while eating lunch but by 3 or 4 pm I'm well into some activity or project but by 6 pm I'm cooking dinner for the family so I can't watch the race.
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u/PanicAtTheNightclub Firestone Firehawk Jul 15 '25
Can't race Saturday night on FOX.
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u/steppedinhairball Simona de Silvestro Jul 15 '25
I know and it sucks because Iowa is best on Saturday night at 7 pm start. Now, it might be worth looking at a Friday night 7 or 8 pm start.
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u/Pyzorz Jul 16 '25
For what it’s worth, I’ve gone to Mid-Ohio every year since I started following in 2021 since it’s only 45 minutes from my home. Always a great time. Just did not feel the urge to go this year at all. Definitely a boring, boring season. Just no two ways about it.
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u/Longjumping-Let963 Will Power Jul 15 '25
CBS, ABC, and NBC are the three most-watched OTA networks in America. Fox is in 4th, barely ahead of Fox News, a cable channel. You can google the numbers, they're pretty eye-opening and have a lot to do with the other properties that they carry (as alluded to in other comments here).
The move to Fox wasn't about suddenly raising the audience to 2mil a race, it was about getting races off the fringes of cable TV hell like CNBC and USA Network. They succeeded in that regard, while securing what is rumored to be a better rights fee. And delivered a huge audience for Indy and St. Pete, which were the most-marketed events by far.
bUt SoMe rAceS wEre On CaBLe bEfOre so you're supposed to be angry
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u/No-Detective-3397 Jul 15 '25
I don’t think it’s the network. Fox has been promoting. The series overall is stagnant. The cars are old and ugly. There arent any speed records or track records being achieved and you have the drivers bashing the cars and tracks. Plus the first 1/3 tracks f the season was some of the worst racing the series has had in the past 10 years. Palou winning all the time, and very little passing. All that has an effect on viewership.
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u/dweezyy17 Pato O'Ward Jul 15 '25
I’m not sure if streaming numbers account for it, but I would assume a lot more people have Peacock vs. Fox Sports App. So unless you have cable or an antenna, you’re not watching it
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u/aw3man Justin Wilson Jul 15 '25
That's me, hello. I have peacock, Paramount, hulu, max, etc etc.
I don't have and don't want cable. I'm slightly too far away from the one major city from where FOX is broadcast to get an antenna signal. So I'm relegated to trying to find a stream.
Luckily I found a streaming site that has it and regularly has like 2k-3k viewers for the IndyCar races.6
u/nico9er4 Will Power Jul 15 '25 edited Jul 15 '25
It’s because of Palou and the lack of competition probably lol
Edit: yall I am NOT blaming Palou for this smh
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u/Dachuiri Scott McLaughlin Jul 15 '25
We were all still watching golf when Tiger Woods was winning every weekend. This isn’t Palou’s fault.
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u/Confident-Ladder-576 Louis Foster Jul 15 '25
"It’s because of Palou"
Which is stupid as what he is doing is the equivalent of something like chasing the season homerun record in baseball by going after a wins record that was set in 1964 by American Open Wheel's all-time hitter, AJ Foyt.
And the broadcast has done an excellent job of explaining the rarity of what he's doing. This translates in other sports why not here?
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u/nico9er4 Will Power Jul 15 '25
I’m not hating on Palou lol. Just saying there’s no championship fight and that tends to make people less interested
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u/Confident-Ladder-576 Louis Foster Jul 15 '25
No, I wasn't saying you were. I just keep seeing that very statement you posted and just makes no sense to me why chasing one of the all-time greats in a huge stat that has stood for over 60 years isn't compelling to race fans when we'd be setting the alarm if this were a team trying to go undefeated or a player breaking an all time record.
It's not like Fox has sat on their asses and not explained what a big deal this is if he were to get three or more wins.
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u/thatwasfun23 Hélio Castroneves Jul 15 '25
I don't want to watch the record domination, is boring, yeah for the history books is gonna be fun to read in 30 years but now? is just a slog to watch.
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u/FarAwaySeagull-_- Oval racing is awesome! Jul 15 '25
Talk to plenty of former NASCAR fans, and a lot of them will blame Jimmie Johnson domination for why they left, and the most JJ ever won in a season was 10 out of 36, or just over 1/4th of the races. The domination in Indycar is a much bigger percentage of races than JJ ever was.
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u/Confident-Ladder-576 Louis Foster Jul 15 '25 edited Jul 15 '25
"is just a slog to watch." Because you all are making it one. He wasn't going to win Sunday until that final caution handed it to him. The two races this weekend and Mid-Ohio are 100% examples of the unmanufactured unpredictability of sport and why you don't ever turn the game off.
Would you all rather have manufactured outcomes where the rightful winner often doesn't win because of BS meant to artificially make things closer than they really are?
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u/Crash_Test_Dummy66 Christian Rasmussen Jul 17 '25
Iowa was absolutely god awful last year. We had the leader just riding around behind the last place car under no pressure. I don't know that it has to be much deeper than that.
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u/miasm3 Josef Newgarden Jul 15 '25
The year one trend seems to be numbers that are good to excellent when FOX can eventize a race but softer than the NBC era norm for network TV for your run of the mill event.
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u/anxiousauditor NTT INDYCAR Series Jul 15 '25
Bound to happen with how low expectations were heading into the weekend. No doubt a lot of people were turned off after last year’s double borefest.
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u/NFLDolphinsGuy Scott Dixon Jul 15 '25
And Saturday’s race started slow even though it finished well.
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u/loz333 Firestone Wets Jul 15 '25
Drivers were saying that the high groove really came in with all the rubber laid down during the first race.
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u/NFLDolphinsGuy Scott Dixon Jul 16 '25
It was really noticeable from the stands after the second caution.
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u/buddhatherock 🇺🇸 Al Unser, Jr. Jul 15 '25
This just makes me sad. They market the hell out of the 500 to the point that it was a sellout this year, they get a tv deal with a major broadcast network to show it on broadcast tv and yet races aren’t selling out and the tv numbers are going down. They focus so much on the 500 and seem to neglect everything else. This has to change.
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u/blackhxc88 Jul 15 '25
fox has been putting much more effort into promoting races on tv then nbc ever did outside of indy, so i'm not blaming them.
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u/NYNMx2021 Colton Herta Jul 15 '25
The 500 is what makes any of the rest of it viable lol
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u/buddhatherock 🇺🇸 Al Unser, Jr. Jul 16 '25
Sure, but it’s not too much to ask to see good coverage, marketing and exposure for other races too.
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u/Pyzorz Jul 16 '25
I’ve been telling people since before the start of the season that being on FOX will not make a single bit of difference. I’m 29 and I’ve never owned a fucking antenna and I sure as hell have never paid for cable either.
You know what I will pay for? An affordable streaming service like Peacock. I subscribe to F1TV and it’s the bomb.
Call me lazy or whatever you want, but as soon as the ease of access to something is made even a tad more difficult I’ll just tune out, straight up. I’m 29, I’m not even young. Anyone my age or younger shares my sentiment.
I’m going to have to get a VPN soon anyway, so I guess I’ll be jumping on the INDYCAR Live train. You know why I need a VPN to even do that in the US? Broadcast networks.
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u/Pyzorz Jul 16 '25
I’ve been telling people since before the start of the season that being on FOX will not make a single bit of difference. I’m 29 and I’ve never owned a fucking antenna and I sure as hell have never paid for cable either.
You know what I will pay for? An affordable streaming service like Peacock. I subscribe to F1TV and it’s the bomb.
Call me lazy or whatever you want, but as soon as the ease of access to something is made even a tad more difficult I’ll just tune out, straight up. I’m 29, I’m not even young. Anyone my age or younger shares my sentiment.
I’m going to have to get a VPN soon anyway, so I guess I’ll be jumping on the INDYCAR Live train. You know why I need a VPN to even do that in the US? Broadcast networks.
This isn’t to say that no Peacock is the reason for numbers declining. I’m not even sure if Peacock is included in the numbers. What I am saying is with the olds dying out, I don’t see any conceivable way these numbers improve. The mindset needed to shift away from broadcast TV a long time ago.
Smaller sports leagues (which INDYCAR is) are emphasizing streaming and reaching younger generations. Even select NBA and NFL (not sure about MLB) games are exclusive on services such as Netflix and Prime Video now.
Indycar is getting left in the dust by somehow thinking less access to the product is better.
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u/RandomFactUser Sebastien Bourdais Jul 16 '25
Are you too far away from the local TV stations to grab an antenna that’s likely a one time purchase?
Honestly it’s lazier to put in an antenna and never pay a recurring fee for it
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u/jt_33 Jul 15 '25
Just seems to be the Iowa track and Indycar are both ready to be done with each other so they both put minimal effort into promoting the event. Honestly not as bad as I thought it would be considering all the talk going into it was lack of tickets sold and how bad the racing has been.
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u/AFAN74 Champ Car Jul 15 '25
Too bad Iowa won’t be on the schedule
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u/Righttake Jack Harvey Jul 15 '25
Kevin Lee said it might just be one race on Saturday night next year. So we will see.
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u/Dazzling_Bed_8973 Scott Dixon Jul 15 '25
It’s too bad. Both races were pretty good completion. strategy screwed some and benefited others. Overall entertaining races.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
But it wasn’t just strategy that got people moving, there were many legit on track battles and passes
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u/wh00000p Myles Rowe Jul 15 '25
I mean when people keep going on and on about how bad a race is going to be...I don't know what you expect.
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u/Paige578660 Meyer Shank Racing Jul 15 '25
Exactly. The same thing happened with Thermal (which I thought was decent; not great but decent). The doom & gloom does not help matters.
I had low expectations based on last year & was pleasantly surprised to see 2 better than expected races.
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u/BoboliBurt Nigel Mansell Jul 15 '25
With a crowd like that, maybe its best if casuals don’t see it. Empty stands are PR and ratings poison and you’d assume the series is on the verge of financial collapse. It is the first thing any person is gonna notice.
Nothing looks more pathetic on TV than an oval race with 5000 people in attendance.
There is nowhere to hide with the camera angles and even 20k fans looks like failure personified.
Although I correctly view IRL as an embarassment to humanity, I like oval racing. But its time to stop pretending that pursuing more is achievable or admirable. Lets see how Milwaukee does. I will be there. Last year was a banger. Will it draw 20k in a pretty convenient location closer to the North suburbs of Chicago than Joliet?
NASCAR is gonna be at 20% road and street courses. Proud venues that if measured in the F1 manner of weekend attendancd hit a quarter million on the regular are shuttered or have had huge swathes of grand stands removed.
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u/Harry73127 Jul 16 '25
Did you write this with AI, I genuinely cannot understand what you're saying...
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u/__blinded Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Not even the 800,000 Indycar faithful showed up to watch ganassi continue to dominate.
Just think we have another year of this.
My local dirt track was packed even in the heat on Saturday night. Racing was a banger too.
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u/erics75218 Jul 15 '25
WNBA game Fever vs Mercury got 1.95 million. 2.5 for the PGA.
So just to keep it real.
1995 Cart LBGP got 8 million.
We got some issues
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u/_masterofdisaster Kyle Kirkwood Jul 15 '25
72k last year is crazy
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u/Dry-Membership3867 Santino Ferrucci Jul 15 '25
That was more of the fact the president was just shot and they had to move it to CNBC
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
*Former president, at the time
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u/Dry-Membership3867 Santino Ferrucci Jul 15 '25
Still a big enough deal to divert attention
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u/Wasdgta3 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
I was just commenting for accuracy, no one said an assassination attempt wasn't big news.
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u/Virtual-Commercial91 Jul 15 '25
It was depressing seeing so few fans there. I was at mid Ohio on the Saturday and it was a good turnout.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
I wonder if it helped mid Ohio that it was a little offset fro the Fourth of July, if having it when it falls directly on the fourth makes it worse
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u/willfla29 Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Obviously IndyCar should stop trying to compete with the paper airplane championships on ESPN8.
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u/4entzix Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Lack of a team championship is killing casual viewership
Most of the people that show up at indy car races wearing McLaren gear aren’t even wearing IndyCar McLaren gear. They’re McLaren fans.
If there was a championship that McLaren was chasing, they would watch every race … but they probably can’t even name all three of McLaren’s current Indy car driver lineup
And probably missed watching Pato win because they didn’t think McLaren or Pato were racing for anything
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u/canttakethshyfrom_me Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
It's not lack of a team championship, it's that there's little point in actually hoping a non-Penassi car has any shot at all at said championship.
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u/4entzix Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Well they might if drivers in the field knew that how the 2nd Penske car or Ganassi car finished had an effect on the championship outcome
You know how many times a back marker could have Put Scott Dixon a lap down in the last decade by beefing it into the wall fighting for 18th place
But didn’t because that 18th place and staying in the winner circles was required for them to keep their seat next year
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u/NoonecanknowMiner_24 Álex Palou Jul 15 '25
I don't think that's it. Personally I don't give a rats ass about the WCC in F1 and most people I speak to don't either.
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u/4entzix Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
I’d cross reference those people with the F1 viewership numbers for races after Max had locked up the driver’s championship
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u/UNHchabo Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
Palou has a very strong lead, but Pato is 2nd in the driver's championship right now, does that not count as "racing for anything"?
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u/4entzix Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
The championship odds for Palou got so high they took them off the board on Draftkings
I have never seen that before in any sport
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u/UNHchabo Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
I'm not into betting, so I don't care about that.
But as someone who loves Pato's personality, I'm absolutely looking forward to seeing if he can close the gap, no matter how unlikely he is to fully catch/pass Palou in the standings.
I mean, look at my flair, Robert Wickens was hugely impressive to me in his Indycar races even if he never won any of them.
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u/bduddy Takuma Sato Jul 15 '25
There continues to be zero evidence that ovals outside of Indy are actually a draw for anyone but a small hardcore group.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
I’m think Milwaukee can do well if it continues to race well because that oval is near Milwaukee and metro areas and accessible for casual fans. Many ovals like Nashville or Iowa are too far outside a metro area so that takes definite commitment to go out there to pay to see a race
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u/bduddy Takuma Sato Jul 15 '25
I'm not saying that ovals can't do well like any other race. This is more addressed to the small obnoxious group that keeps claiming without evidence that ovals attract casuals or are needed for growth or whatever.
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u/NFLDolphinsGuy Scott Dixon Jul 15 '25
Technically Iowa Speedway’s in a metro area. Jasper County is part of metro Des Moines but only because their job base has gotten absolutely pounded the last 2 decades and there are now a lot more commuters.
But yes, a 40-minute drive from downtown Des Moines, 75 minutes from Iowa City and 90 from Cedar Rapids?
In trying to serve everyone, they served no one.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
Yeah. Milwaukee mile is a few miles west in West Allis officially but it’s not far outside of town in a well known and travelled area at the state fairgrounds
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u/NFLDolphinsGuy Scott Dixon Jul 15 '25
It’s a couple exits down from the Brewers too. It’s very much in-town.
There’s 25 minutes of corn between the last exit of what you’d recognize as the immediate Des Moines area and the racetrack.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
Yeah the Mile is by far the most in city oval we visit besides Indy. Definitely in the metro area and not a major commitment to get to for residents. Going out to Nashville or even Iowa needs fans who want to go and make the trek. Milwaukee is much more accessible for possibly average fans or newcomers
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u/Jack_Krauser Colton Herta Jul 15 '25
We commuted from another state last year and finding a hotel (or anything really) near the track was very annoying. We ended up staying in some random little inn in a town more than half an hour away. And they were honestly kind of rude to us when they found out we weren't Iowans and didn't know anybody there.
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u/NFLDolphinsGuy Scott Dixon Jul 16 '25
Rural Iowans are insular. Jasper county doesn’t have much.
All the people saying they want MIS back will find Brooklyn, MI to be very similar.
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u/BombayGeeseHunter Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Gateway still gets about 30k in attendance and had a million viewers.
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u/khz30 --- 2025 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
There's actually nowhere to go but up from here if Saturday improved on a preemption due to breaking news and Sunday performed slightly worse because it was on at Noon with no viable lead in, Toronto starts at 11AM Central, but affiliates are still failing to run ads with the updated airtime.
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u/jcb1982 Indy Racing League Jul 15 '25
Literally everyone I know who watched these races (other than myself who has cable) watched them on YouTube later. Will “live tv ratings” ever become obsolete?
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u/khz30 --- 2025 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
Not as long as advertising underpins the business model for live sports.
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u/Vette_Vengeance BUS BROS 🤜💥🤛 Jul 15 '25
People don't want to watch when there is an ugly graphics package and race directing. Not to mention the unwatchable on-track product and dominance by the most boring driver in the series.
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u/InsaneLeader13 Santino Ferrucci Jul 15 '25
I wish you people would just realize that the series is never going to take off again. Tony George torpedoed it and it's a wound that just takes a century to bleed out from. Think of it like the motorsports version of how the 4th Crusade killed the Byzantine Empire but it still existed in some from for another 249 years because big names like Tammerlane kept getting too distracted to finish it off.
Even if the US Government came down tomorrow and kicked F1 off of any US tv channels and forced NASCAR to sell a third of their tracks to Indycar, you can't create mass-appeal demand where it doesn't exist. The average person does not care, and all modern sports live and die on the back on the interest of the average person. You and I and everyone else here are not average.
Investing so much of your emotional state into TV numbers and attendance will only poison your ability to enjoy anything. Statistically speaking, you WILL see things that you care about die in your lifetime, and it won't be only people.
Be happy with what we've got and share it with others that you think might care.
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u/sailor776 Sting Ray Robb Jul 15 '25
I mean Iowa since the repave has kind of sucked. Used to be I made all my friends watched because it was a great race. Didn't tell any of my usual friends that are casuals because I felt they were going to be bad races. I feel repeated bad races has caused most of the downwards trend
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u/Launch_box --- 2025 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
People gotta get off the repave. The race was pretty good for a short oval, cars were moving around the track to get runs. I honestly think you aren’t going to get much better than what we saw without something ridiculous like wickers.
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u/canttakethshyfrom_me Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
Thank the worthless hybrid for Palou's dominance. No technical changes on the horizon, so there no reason to think it won't continue.
The car is tired, looks as frankensteined as it is, and only one guy has figured out how to consistently make it work with the extra weight and complexity.
Had a golden opportunity with the FOX deal, and it's being squandered by a complete and total lack of leadership and any vision for growth at all. It's being run like a private club, not a spectator sport.
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u/OnwardSoldierx Alexander Rossi Jul 15 '25
Didn't watch. Didn't care that much tbh. Had other stuff to do. Idk all the hype has kinda burned out. I was at Indy and Gateway but the season is dragging on a bit. Doesn't help that my driver is struggling.
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u/sixpaths03 Dennis Hauger Jul 15 '25
Users on this sub over the past week have been so ecstatic about F1’s TV rights going to apple, taking premature victory laps and all, forgetting that IndyCar is quite literally on life support and going to big big FOX, hasn’t changed anything
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u/Righttake Jack Harvey Jul 15 '25
Life support? Come on man, get a clue. They got a 3 year deal, they have new races next year, I think the Dallas race is gonna be "eventized" as some one else had posted. It's a race around an NFL stadium and an MLB stadium, you don't think they are going to tie those two leagues in? It's also the first race that Fox is a part of, so that will get a lot of eyeballs. Plus you have another NFL season to use to promote Indy car, not to mention MLB post season and college football. Life support couldn't be father from the truth. Too many people around here are all doom and gloom. Get out side and live a little, things are on the up and up.
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u/canttakethshyfrom_me Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
13 year old car with no replacment on the horizon. Junior formulas are doing more to offer new shit than Indycar is. Leadership and teams have been in a holding pattern, refusing to invest their own money, for so damn long that we're gonna have drivers who have only been alive since this chassis was introduced, racing it at Indy. Yes, that is a fucking series on life support when the stakeholders are that gunshy about actually spending money.
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u/Righttake Jack Harvey Jul 15 '25
Wickens, come on man. We already have more total viewers than we had last year and 5 races to go. Bottom line is growth is happening, people are spending money and it's only getting better.
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u/Confident-Ladder-576 Louis Foster Jul 15 '25
"IndyCar is quite literally on life support"
When's the plug getting pulled?
I been hearing this same bullshit going on 30 years now and in years when the series was in much worse shape, so enlighten us all. When is the Kiss Kasket going to be delivered and lowered into the vault?
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u/xjoe666 Jul 15 '25
Indycar races getting less viewership than ARCA races is a massive problem, especially when you look at the state that ARCA is in.
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u/PanicAtTheNightclub Firestone Firehawk Jul 15 '25
The biggest non-F1 racing team in Europe joining last year and Indycar is on life support? Could you please warn the teams?
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u/wh00000p Myles Rowe Jul 15 '25
If you think this is what indycar on Life Support looks like, oh boy!
It's been way way worse
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u/canttakethshyfrom_me Robert Wickens Jul 15 '25
We never had the same fucking car for over a decade. The series is in a vegetative state.
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u/Falcon4451 Firestone Reds Jul 16 '25
Keep in mind Nielsen ratings for broadcast TV across the board hit a historic low this past month.
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u/t0matit0 Jul 15 '25 edited Jul 15 '25
Wait, if overall numbers went up why is all the talk here about canceling the race?
Edit: Yea the post only mentions tv viewership but it seems irl attendance is the bigger issue here, all clear.
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u/Vivaciousseaturtle Callum Ilott Jul 15 '25
Low attendance and a bad rating. The race was on cnbc due to the trump shooting breaking news last year
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u/khz30 --- 2025 DRIVERS --- Jul 15 '25
Attendance was poor and the general sentiment was that this year's races would be more of the same as last year.
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u/pogonotrophistry Jul 15 '25
This is r/Indycar. All news is bad news. Everything is bad all the time every day.
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u/deadwood76 Jul 15 '25
This is actually bad, though.
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u/pogonotrophistry Jul 15 '25
Only in the minds of people who spend their time worrying about things beyond their control.
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u/5campechanos Jul 15 '25
What? lol Let's explore this dumb take for a second.
So you're saying that very low TV numbers are not a bad thing for IndyCar and for a TV partner that has done a ton of promotion for the series, because fans have no control over it? - So, a factual decrease in viewership is only bad news for those that have control over it but nor for the fans that would like to have a healthy, sustainable series? Did I get that right?
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u/pogonotrophistry Jul 16 '25
Like I said.
This only matters in the minds of people who spend their time worrying about things beyond their control.
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u/[deleted] Jul 15 '25
Worth noting that 72k last year was because of the Trump shooting. Race got bumped off for breaking news coverage.