BBC to stop covering Formula 1 in UK from 2013 season – Formula 1 news
Broadcasting giant British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has hinted that it might stop covering Formula 1 starting from the 2013 season in the United Kingdom.
The 2013 season will also see the introduction of environment friendly V4 engines in the sport.
A report published in a British daily has revealed this story.
“It has emerged that F1 costs £1 a head for every viewer, compared with the average 7p an hour broadcast cost for BBC1 and BBC2. Apart from the British Grand Prix, most races attract only between 2 million and 4 million viewers,” said the report.
BBC has the best commentary panel with former drivers David Coulthard and Martin Brundle who are probably the best two people for this job in the sport. Both of these former drivers have a lot of knowledge about the sport as compared to the rest of the commentary
panels of the rest of the media partners of the sport.
Once again, the financial constraints might lead to this outcome as the report revealed that broadcasting the sport costs BBC £60 million each year. However, earlier reports suggest that this is not the first time this problem has arisen.
The sport’s viewership through BBC is around 2 – 4 million and some other reports in March 2011 revealed that BBC might not be able to broadcast from the 2017 Formula 1 season due to financial issues as they might not be able to deal with the new rules regarding
the license fees from that season.
However, another report claims that the viewership of the sport during the 2011 Monaco and Spanish Grand Prix reached a peak level of 6 million viewers for BBC which is clearly in contrast to this report.
These are just rumours as nothing has been revealed officially yet but it is believed that the BBC Trust will hold a major meeting somewhere around the final quarter of the 2011 Formula 1 season after which they might come up with a decision. Let’s see how
it unfolds.
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