Rossi exploits boost MotoGP TV audiences With five victories out of six races so far this season, one could expect that Valentino Rossi’s domination would disappoint the MotoGP fans, but the way the Italian superstar reaches success is actually so entertaining and exciting that audiences keep growing every race weekend. Rossi’s win at Catalunya last Sunday scored again record audiences in his home country, where Italia 1’s broadcast was followed by almost 8.5 million viewers, with a 48.18% market share. Surprisingly, the audience in Spain was also outstanding despite the fact that Rossi’s victim of the day was Sete Gibernau, in front of his Barcelona crowd. TVE-1 had 33.3% of the audience tuned to the MotoGP race, and did even better (38,6%) for the 250cc race, where Spain’s young hope Dani Pedrosa won his third consecutive GP. The total audience was 2.8 and 2.1 million respectively. MotoGP enjoys wealthy audiences both in Italy and Spain thanks to the success of their riders. In the United Kingdom, BBC is consolidating very good ratings without having a local hero in the leading positions. The broadcast from the Catalunya Grand Prix scored 1.4 million viewers, with a 16.3% share. Other countries also have had significant audience figures for the past few MotoGP races. As an example, Nelonen/Channel Four Finland scored 32% market share for the last round of the 125cc World Championship, where Mika Kallio is one of the main protagonists.