Fox Sports’ coverage of the Indianapolis 500, the crown jewel of U.S. car races, drew 7.05 million viewers for Sunday’s running, the network said. That metric, based on Nielsen fast nationals, is up 40% over last year’s race viewership and makes this year’s race the most-watched Indy 500 since 2008.
The race, won by Álex Palou, marked the first for Fox under its new TV rights deal inked last June for the IndyCar series, held the past six years by NBC.
Last year, NBC’s coverage drew 5.024 million viewers.
Fox went all in for its first year leading coverage at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, showing all of qualifying over the weekend before beginning coverage on race day at 10:30 a.m. ET. The race itself was carried live on Fox, Fox Deportes and the Fox Sports app beginning at 12:45 p.m. ET.
According to Nielsen, the viewership peaked between 4:15-4:30 p.m. ET at the climax, when Palou took over first place with 14 laps left and led the rest of the way.
Palou, with Chip Ganassi Racing, won Indy for the first time and became the first Spaniard to win at the race in its 109th running. He came into the day leading the IndyCar series with four wins in the season’s five races.
Fox Sports, which is carrying all IndyCar series races as part of its rights deal, has three on the schedule for June: the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix on June 1, the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 in Illinois and the XPEL Grand Prix at Road American in Wisconsin.
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