Motorsports in mainstream media in your country?

I was a bit disappointed that Aleshin's crash was the only thing Finnish media reported about the final IndyCar race. But after a quick look on some newspapers' and tabloids' websites, I saw articles only on American sites, and not on all of them, saw nothing e.g. on NY Times' website.

I guess in Europe, motorsports are F1 and maybe MotoGP for the mainstream media.

In my home country, Finland, F1 gets quite a lot media coverage. I'd say the most after hockey. WRC is probably the 2nd most important series and gets coverage in the mainstream media, yet has gotten a bit more of a niche sport after its heyday. MotoGP is the 3rd most important series and covered in the mainstream media. But hardly anything else gets mentioned in the mainstream media, maybe Indy 500 and Le Mans winners.

Edit: And I forgot the obvious thing. A big crash gets always mentioned. It doesn't even have to be a serious crash if it involves somebody who's driven in F1 or is a celebrity otherwise.

Edited by August, 31 August 2014 - 12:45.

Motorsports is never mentioned unless someone dies

Ferrari, yes, every day   

Lewis Hamilton

F1 is about 3rd or 4th in the order behind football, cricket and rugby.

Unless someone dies. I only remember seeing anything IndyCar in the papers when Dan Wheldon died. Sean Edwards domination of the early part of last seasons Porsche Supercup went unnoticed until he died. Never saw anything about Nascar until Tony Stewart ran over that other driver in a Sprint Car.

With the internet so handy, I never consult mainstream media for anything. For baseball scores and news, I consult the MLB website. For the NHL or NFL, I consult their respective sites. For F1, I come right here to the Autosport Forums, where I can always count on the Lewista for their factually accurate and totally unbiased reports on all things F1.

I can happily correct myself that at least one European newspaper had an article about the InfyCar final race:

http://www.theguardi...ar-championship

I was a bit disappointed that Aleshin's crash was the only thing Finnish media reported about the final IndyCar race. 

 

Aleshin crashed?  There was an Indycar race?  Who knew?  No-one in the UK media certainly.  

As usual, the sports coverage of a typical UK newspaper is 7 pages about football, a couple of stories about cricket and/or rugby if there is an international series of some sort happening, a couple of pages of gee-gee racing.  Anything else gets a couple of column inches at best.

Edited by BRG, 01 September 2014 - 18:28.

In my local paper here in Sweden, Seb used to get a mention for every win when he had his run last year. This year the only thing I've seen was a spread in the sports section about the new technology. 

Other then F1 I don't think I've ever seen anything.

Edited by ollebompa, 01 September 2014 - 18:36.

I can happily correct myself that at least one European newspaper had an article about the InfyCar final race:

 

http://www.theguardi...ar-championship

Well, yes. But unless you went via Google News it was very hard to find, as if you go from the home page it's classified under 'Australian Sport'! And it's a straight reprint of an Australian agency report. Were it not for the fact that they have recently launched an Australian online edition I doubt they would have bothered at all. It probably wasn't in the print edition.

If you search their site for IndyCar, the next two results are Dario's massive shunt last year and the death of Dan Wheldon.

Which is sadly representative of how little notice even the 'broadsheets' pay to any motor sport outside Eff One.

If you search their site for IndyCar, the next two results are Dario's massive shunt last year and the death of Dan Wheldon.

The Guardian also has a report from this year's season opener at St Petersburg. Which if anything is even more mysterious because it doesn't seem aimed at an Australian audience -- or even an American one, despite its US edition -- given the quotes from Mark Blundell (who he?) and references to Lewis Hamilton winning that day's Malaysian GP. Not only does the correspondent John Bone not have a page anywhere on the website, but a quick Google Search doesn't turn up anything about him. Maybe he was on holiday?

Edited by Risil, 01 September 2014 - 18:51.

Formula 1, DTM & Moto GP is what I have seen last year in tv .... as far as motorsport is concerned I was hoping for Formula E to get taken up but sadly that doesn't seem to be that way

outside you see Vettels face around quite often.... but not as often as you did with the Schumacher brothers....  before I started watching again 2012 or was it 2011? Before then i didn't even know that Seb had become worldchampion 2010

Edited by Sin, 01 September 2014 - 20:31.

In the U.S., nationally motorsport is just ahead of hockey in coverage. Well, at least NASCAR is there. You have the NFL, baseball, basketball, NASCAR, hockey, soccer. 

But in certain times of the year, other events get more coverage. Indy 500 is still the biggest race in the U.S., and the media still does a decent job portraying it as such. I believe I had seen a bit or two on ESPN about the US Grand Prix in Austin. But that was for the first race in '12. 

Formula 1, DTM & Moto GP is what I have seen last year in tv .... as far as motorsport is concerned I was hoping for Formula E to get taken up but sadly that doesn't seem to be that way

 

 

http://www.fiaformul...-tv-rights.aspx

In the Netherlands normally it's 90/95% Formula 1 and the other 5/10% is split between the Zandvoort DTM race, the Rotterdam F1 street event and some news about Dutch drivers or talents (like Beitske Visser immediately winning a GT race or having a heavy crash). 

Lately there's a lot of interest of course in the Max Verstappen story - but that's quite understandable because of his age, his dad and the F1 connection.

Edited by scheivlak, 01 September 2014 - 22:16.

I didn't see much about the Indycar in Australia but I don't watch the news or read papers just check a few news sites. You'd expect it to get a mention seeing how Will Power secured the title.  Formula 1 has had a massive jump in media coverage on Australia over the last 5 or so years in my opinion.  This would coincide with when Webber started winning then had a crack at the title that really got people finally talking F1. With Ricciardo doing so well it's getting even more media attention which is great.

Checked some Aussie papers' websites and definitely more IndyCar articles than in Europe. For example here:

http://www.smh.com.a...m.au&view=media

In Australia, if it isnt "home grown" it hardly gets a mention.

The V8 Supercars series over here gets force fed to us on a regular basis but I lost interest in it years ago due to the boof-head path it has gone down.  The talk shows they had (still have???) pretty much just features drivers talking stupid smack to each other...its the 4 wheel version of AFL football...boring.

We get a regular staple of F1 being televised late at night etc, but unless an Aussie driver is winning/doing well there is no mention of it outside of the telecast.

MotoGP we get televised, but ZERO mention outside of that since Stoner retired.

Apart from that pretty much zilch in the mainstream.

Unless you are internet savvy or have a Fox account you will have missed out on THE MOST successful Australian international motocross career in history in Chad Reed.  The most successful international rider to ever compete in the US and one of the rare "super talents" in that sport.  He is in his twilight years at the moment with probably 2 years left at most of racing.  His career utterly amazing....most of Australia outside of the MX scene would have NFI who he is.

Just like Europe, the American media is tucked WAY too far up its own self serving ass.

Yep.  Over here they are chasing dollars and eyeballs for the most part and have given up on journalism, with a few exceptions. They give people what they want to hear and see vs. reporting what is happening in an objective manner. The best sources I see over here are Al Jazerra America and BBC World.  Everything else is either polarized talking points or rich, old white men yelling at each other and calling it a debate.

For the OP,  even in the US you don't see a lot of Indycar coverage outside of the Indy500, perhaps USA Today and whatever local paper where the series is running.  It used to be very common but with the split and the rise of stock car racing outside the south not so much these days.

Yeah even Nascrap drivers watch this guy,before they go racing themselves.  Lewis.

Edited by raiderhall, 02 September 2014 - 01:29.

Singapore? No. They dont really promote motorsports here, other than now, when Formula 1 is coming to town in three weeks time. Blah. Most of the time, i bet they take their news from Sky f1, espn or Autosport. Not much technical stuff in the media too, just who wins, who goes to which team whatever.

Edited by Ev0d3vil, 02 September 2014 - 01:54.

I avoid the MSM like the plague.  Slowly it would seem others are as well.

What Indycar?

-From India

What would we do without the internet.. hard to believe there was ever a time without it.  I used to buy a weekly newspaper for NBA scores and would find out the scores and boxscores a week after they were played, with 20 secs of highlights on late night sport shows if you were lucky.  Now you can chat with fans, post on message boards, watch each game live etc etc.

Similar with international motor sports.  Can't imagine how bad it must have been back in the day, when you had to rely on radio or newspapers or news highlights to follow it.  Outside of diehard motorsport fans, the only thing that seems to appeal is the crashes.  Motor sport = the sport with all the crashes.

Aleshin crashed?  There was an Indycar race?  Who knew?  No-one in the UK media certainly.  

In Australian press it was mentioned that Will Power finally won the championship. 

When F1 was in Open TV  it had feedback in several newspapers. Front pages on Monday.

There was even a time that in Portugal there were 2-3 weekly newspapers dedicated to automobile sports and industry. Not anymore, i think there remained only one called Autosport but lost its independence now is part of a group. Now we have more monthly magazines many that copy foreign articles.

When Rally de Portugal was staple of World Championship those 4-5 days it made the front pages of every newspapers. Not anymore . When FIA started rotating and discretized what was a Tradition -  there wasn't any going back.

It was destroyed.

In those times automobile sports could compete with football. That is obviously lost. So things have been going downhill for a long time.

What would we do without the internet.. hard to believe there was ever a time without it.  I used to buy a weekly newspaper for NBA scores and would find out the scores and boxscores a week after they were played, with 20 secs of highlights on late night sport shows if you were lucky.  Now you can chat with fans, post on message boards, watch each game live etc etc.
 
Similar with international motor sports.  Can't imagine how bad it must have been back in the day, when you had to rely on radio or newspapers or news highlights to follow it.  Outside of diehard motorsport fans, the only thing that seems to appeal is the crashes.  Motor sport = the sport with all the crashes.

Germany:

1.) Football

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nothing

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2.) F1

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nothing nothing

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3.) Cycling / DTM / Handball / Athletics

The mainstream media in the US thinks all motorsport is NASCAR.

In France there is not much motorsports in the mainstream media. When there is, it's:

1) F1 despite no French driver winning a race in nearly 20 years

2) WRC (10 titles in the last 10 seasons - makes sense)

3) MotoGP

4) Le Mans during Le Mans - but no LMS outside that.

That's for the series for which you can grab the results from mainstream sports TV shows. Other series you may get some information sometimes, usually a report about a French driver in an "unknown series" like IndyCar or GP2 (back in the day, some people would know "Bourdais was doing well in American F1").

The mainstream media in the US thinks all motorsport is NASCAR.

A friend has just came back from the States. He was trying to describe what a Sprintcar is and does to Americans! In California. But everyone know what Nascar is. Have heard of Danica and Tony Stewart.

Though I recently had a similar problem with a lady who does watch Supercar and on the odd occasion the bikes and F1

As a matter of interest who knows what international motorsport even happened in Iowa about 3 weeks ago?

Here in Ireland, motorsport coverage in the media has been in sharp decline from the highs of the mid to late 90s.  The likes of Jordan and Eddie Irvine popularised the sport in Ireland.  However, their absence from the sport IMO isn't the only reason for its fall from grace.

F1 and MotorGP results will get mentioned on the new.  Outside of that, Irish drivers doing well in other formulae will get a mention.  Virtually all papers will carry reports on F1 and MotoGP.  Outside of that, Indy 500 and LeMans results will also get a mention.

As a consumer of the English-speaking media in Canada I would begrudgingly give it a passing grade, just. I suspect it's much better in Quebec. Perhaps even satisfying. Can anyone confirm, please? 

I should get the Danica phenomenon out of the way first: ANY footage of Her Sassiness is catnip to the content decision-makers. Also irresistible was the media's obscene lynching of Tony Stewart.

NASCAR is the staple and is top of mind for all content decision-makers. The fan base is deep and wide although perhaps not the religion it is Stateside. I imagine such fans crave a greater share of the media's attention.

F1 is not ignored but not one second more than is necessary is provided. Telecasts are not condensed but couldn't be more minimal. We get Coulthard not Brundle.  Unless it's Grand Prix weekend in Montreal articles in print are only found in Automotive sections and even that is a rarity.

Indy 500? Yep, coverage is pretty good. 

When the Indycars come to Toronto the media plays it up like it still mattered. Good for them, I guess. 

Le Mans? There is always a full page dedicated to the results: the one Audi buys the day after. Beyond that, not a word. Criminal, it is.

Daytona 24 and Sebring? Canadian stories are mentioned. Notice the pattern among so many countries? Interest is assumed only when one of "ours" is present. The exercise itself is ... meh.

WRC? Moto GP? Ha! As if. 

Edited by nordschleife, 08 September 2014 - 20:52.

Motor racing is only ever covered in Dutch mainstream media if there are (a) crashes, (b) scandals, © a Dutch driver, or (d) all of the above involved. Mostly it's (d). ;-)

Robert Kubica.

Plus some reports from F1 races.

Other than that, motorsport does not exist in Polish mainstream media.