This past Saturday, the Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway in Atlanta marked the first NASCAR Cup Series race aired on TNT since July 2014, attracting 1.608 million viewers, according to Adam Stern of Sports Business Journal. The renewed TNT coverage demonstrated NASCAR’s ability to pull a solid audience on a Saturday night, even amid some criticism.
Jeff Gluck of The Athletic expressed frustration over the numbers, noting the challenge Saturday night NASCAR races face in drawing viewers. He remarked,
“Ugh, Saturday night NASCAR races just can’t seem to pull numbers. NASCAR says it got an average of 1.6 million viewers for the Atlanta race. Also, if you were wondering about F1 viewership on the F1 movie’s premiere weekend, the Austria race got 1.1 million viewers (a record for that race, but only up two percent over last year).”
—Jeff Gluck, Journalist
In contrast, Ryan Blaney highlighted NASCAR’s dominance in viewership over Formula One, tweeting,
“We crush the parade every week.”
He added,
“So, we got 500k more folks tuned in,”
and emphasized,
“Why do people make it out to be a bad thing? We crush the parade every week, so why do we get down in the dumps by this? NASCAR is currently crushing it.”
—Ryan Blaney, NASCAR Driver
Comparing NASCAR and Formula One Ratings in 2025
Although not a direct comparison, last September’s NASCAR playoff race in Atlanta attracted 2.02 million viewers despite competing against <a href="https://www.buzzineintl.com/category/football/nfl/”>NFL programming on a Sunday, while the previous year’s event at Nashville Superspeedway pulled an even larger crowd of 3.24 million on NBC. Meanwhile, Formula One races have been averaging about 1.3 million viewers this season across ESPN, ESPN2, and ABC.
Through 18 races this season, NASCAR is averaging 2.88 million viewers, showing strong dominance in the U.S. market over F1. Saturday night’s Atlanta race represented a season low for NASCAR’s viewership, but it still outpaced Formula One comfortably, further supporting Blaney’s view that NASCAR “reigns supreme” domestically.
Upcoming TNT and NBC NASCAR Broadcasts to Watch
As TNT continues to broadcast NASCAR races, it will be important to observe the trend in viewership over the next four events, all slated for Sunday afternoons starting with this weekend’s Chicago Street Race. After these TNT broadcasts conclude, the remaining 14 races will switch to NBC and USA Network for the rest of the season.
This schedule shift comes as NASCAR looks to maintain and potentially grow its strong hold on American motorsports fans against competing sports, including the consistently popular NFL and Formula One broadcasts.