By role
May 10 2004

Spain is becoming a tremendous market for Formula 1. The competitive performances of Renault driver Fernando Alonso are making the sport more popular than ever in the country. Every Grand Prix a higher amount of viewers are turning their Tv sets to the race and are learning about the sport. If the San Marino Grand Prix was the race with the higher amount of viewers in Spain with 3.3 million people turning in to watch Alonso fight Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya to finish 4th yesterday at the Spanish rand Prix this number became small.


Despite many fans attending the race at Barcelona, where they totaled 108.000, a record 5.6 million people watched Alonso cross the line behind his teammate Jarno Trulli.

During the race an average 4.2 million people watched the race with a share of 37.7% of the viewers watching television at that time.

This has made the Spanish Grand Prix the most watched Formula 1 race in Spain.

Just two years ago, in 2002, most of Spanish fans could not follow Formula 1 as no national TV wanted to bid. Two years later a Formula 1 race has had more people watching that the a new episode of The Simpsons or even that the movie "Eyes Wide Shut" with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.

The Spanish Motorbike Grand Prix at Jerez the week before was viewed by 3.1 million people on average what shows that Formula 1 has become the second most viewed sport in Spain only behind football.

It is deemed a success for the Television network Tele 5 that paid 6 million for the rights of the Championship in 2003.