Record TV audiences for Brazilian Grand Prix
The 2006 Formula One world championship showdown in Brazil on Sunday attracted huge television audiences around the world, not least in the respective homelands of title protagonists Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso.
The Interlagos race was watched by a peak of 14.8 million viewers in Germany - the country’s biggest audience in five years and broadcaster RTL's fifth highest Formula One rating ever. The audience share increased from 24% last year to 39.7% this.
Spain too had record viewing figures, with 9.3 million compared to 8 million for the same race last year. French broadcaster TF1 also saw its best ever Formula One audience - a peak of 13.6 million and an average of 8.7 million viewers gave it a 36.9% market share.
Like Germany, Italy and Britain both experienced season-best figures. Italian broadcaster Rai Uno had a 54% audience share, with a peak of 15 million viewers at the end of the race. And on Britain's ITV channel the race was watched by an average of 4.9 million viewers (a 24% audience share), reaching a peak of 6.4 million.
