The intense battles during American Flat Track events are proving to be a big draw for fans who enjoy watching the action on their screens. The 2022 Progressive Insurance AFT season broke viewership records, with a total of 3,377,719 people tuning in to watch, and the 2023 season is already on track to beat those numbers. Not only is viewership up and the fanbase expanding, but it is also becoming more diverse.
American Flat Track recently released their 2023 Viewership & Metric Dashboard, which was current through March 25 and showed a total of 474,547 viewers turned in to watch the Daytona Short Track Doubleheader.
As with the final AFT viewership totals for the 2022 season, FOX Sports coverage took the lion’s share with 359,000 viewers – an approximate average of 179,500 viewers per race, compared to last year’s 167,000 average per race on that platform. FansChoice.tv livestreaming, which was launched halfway through the season last year, came in a distant second with an average of just under 27,000 viewers per race, followed by YouTube Live averaging almost 20,000 and Facebook Live nearly 11,000.
Of particular interest was the demographic shift in the FOX Sports audience, with 36% of viewers being women, as opposed to the 2022 season total of 27%. That computes to more than 129,000 ladies who tuned in to FOX to see Estenson Racing’s Dallas Daniels take a pair of wins at the doubleheader on his Yamaha MT-07 DT. As far as the FansChoice.tv audience, the percentage of females who watched the Daytona races stayed the same as last year at 24%.
Related: Progressive AFT Daytona Short Track II: Daniels Claims Second Win
For the age demographics, FOX Sports saw a slight increase in the older and younger ranges, with the 55+ age bracket increasing from 59% in 2022 to 61% and the 2-24 age group increasing from 13% to 14%. The middle 25-54 age group dropped three points to 25%. On FansChoice.tv, the younger range (18-24) held steady at 8% while the 25-54 group grew by one percent (53%) and the 55+ dropped a point to 39%.
The 2023 AFT season has thus far been thrilling, with close racing among a diverse field of riders and machines. Obviously, it’s too early to say if these total viewership numbers and demographic percentages will hold as the 2023 season progresses, but it’s a positive omen for the series.
