The World Rally Championship has reported a 17-per-cent year-on-year increase in its global television audience for the first seven rounds of the 2017 edition of the motorsport series.
Citing research from audience measurement company Nielsen, the WRC said that more than 436 million people around the world had tuned in to watch coverage of the series so far.
Nearly 120 million people watched coverage of the opening round in Monte Carlo, Monaco – up by 16 million on the previous season.
The WRC also said that global broadcast time increased 10 per cent year-on-year to almost 6,650 hours.
The majority of the global audience tuned in from European countries, although the WRC did experience an increase in viewers from Asia, with China and Japan featuring in the top 10 countries for television audience.
In addition, the WRC recorded more than 36 million views of programmes and coverage on motorsport websites across 20 key markets, not including the series’ own WRC Plus platform and its official channel on video-sharing website YouTube.