Champions: Full Gallop attracted an average weekly audience of 730,000
Champions: Full Gallop attracted an average audience of 730,000 for the six episodes that were broadcast on ITV1.
The opening show was the most popular with 1,030,000 tuning in, making it the third most watched sports documentary of the year on any channel.
Episodes two, three and four faced tougher competition from a strong BBC audience for their Olympics coverage.
There was good news in that 50% of viewers watched two or more episodes and to date there have been a further 1.5million streams of the series on the ITVX platform. The audience on that service was younger than those watching via other platforms.
Interestingly there was a larger percentage of females watching the programme compared to other ITV1 horse racing events.
56% of those watching were female compared to a 40% share for the four days of the Cheltenham Festival and 46% for Royal Ascot.
One of the hopes was the programme would grow interest in the sport from those not currently actively following it. And of those surveyed 70% of viewers had an increased racing perception and were more likely to go and see the sport live.
Champions: Full Gallop told the story of the last National Hunt season including the dramatic battle for the trainers’ title and Harry Cobden beating Sean Bowen to the jockeys’ crown.
It provided behind-the-scenes access to the biggest names in the sport at the biggest meetings.
Discussions are currently taking place over a potential second series.
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