Tony Stewart won the Ford 400 Sunday and, with it, took the season's Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup. You can bet the folks at NASCAR.COM and Turner Sports were more than a little pleased, too, as they had outfitted Stewart's car with a camera to provide a live stream to Facebook--the first time a championship racing event streamed live to the social networking site.
The race was the finale of the NASCAR season. It brought an emotional win for Stewart, who started the race just three points behind Carl Edwards, and produced some heady numbers for NASCAR.COM and Turner.
NASCAR.COM saw page views total 7 million for the day, 44 percent above the 2011 Chase average. Average daily uniques were up 34 percent to 1.1 million. Compared to the Homestead race last year, page views were up 29 percent and average daily uniques increased 25 percent.
For the 10-race season, Turner said, page views for the Sprint Cup were up 19 percent to 53.16 million from 44.68 million a year ago. Daily uniques also were up 19 percent per race, from to 898,244 from 757,361 a year ago.
NASCAR.COM has, for nine Chase races, offered online viewers RaceBuddy, an interactive live product with alternate camera angles; it saw 4.6 million total streams. This year was the first time the RaceBuddy product was extended into the NASCAR postseason.
"This season we unveiled a new homepage, launched a new RaceView and extended coverage of RaceBuddy online and through social media to provide an enhanced race day experience without missing a beat," said Matthew Hong, senior vice president & general manager of Sports Operations for Turner Sports, which manages NASCAR.COM. "...RaceBuddy's growth signifies the fans' continued interest in this online viewing companion."
RaceBuddy wasn't the only part of NASCAR.COM that saw growth this year. During the Chase, video streams tripled to 6.63 million from 2.04 million a year ago.
For more:
- see this release
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