MotoGP Television Audiences Continue to Grow - December 1st 2004

Motogp Television audiences around the globe for the MotoGP World Championship continued to grow in 2004, one of the most exciting seasons in the 55-year history of the series. In total, some 5,226 million viewers tuned in to the sixteen rounds of the championship as Valentino Rossi won the title in his first season with Yamaha, a staggering 121 million more than those who saw him win for Honda the previous year. MotoGP coverage was provided in every corner of the world, with the average number viewers per Grand Prix boosted to 327 million in 208 countries, an increase of 2.5% on 2003.

Almost half of that total (148 million) watched the races live in 185 countries, through 47 terrestrial and pan-continental broadcasters. Improved exposure from free-to-air broadcasters saw the total broadcast hours for the season also increased, rising 4% to 3,729 hours. In addition, 270 million homes were reached by cable or satellite Adding to established broadcasters, such as Mediaset (Italy), TVE (Spain), BBC (Great Britain), RTL (Germany), NHK and NTV (Japan), Ten and Fox (Australia), Globo (Brazil), RTL Club (Belgium), RTE (Ireland), Nelonen (Finland), NOS (Netherlands), TSI, TSR and DRS (Switzerland), ATV+ (Austria), Guangdong TV, Shanghai TV and Beijing TV (China) and Center TV (Russia), new channels in 2004 included Magic TV (Greece), Prime TV (New Zealand), Ten Sports (India and Pakistan), Channel 11 (Thailand), RTS (Serbia) and Al Jazeera Sport (Middle East).

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