What series do you watch?

[Akrapovic]

I was thinking about my motorsport viewing habits earlier and realised that 5 years ago I used to watch single seaters and only a bit of sportscars. I'd watch GP3, GP2 and F1, IndyCar etc. Now I don't watch any of them, but I do watch a lot more sportscars. So I decided to make a poll of all the decently big series to see how everybodies viewing habits compare.

So here is a list of all the major sportscar series, most of the relevant national series for the majority of the forum, and some other outlying series. I realise some will not be happy that not everything is included, but going back several pages on this forum, these are the main ones. I've separated the big events from their series (some of us might watch Le Mans, but not WEC, or Sebring, but not IMSA, or even Spa 24, but not the rest of blancpain), to see if there's a significant difference between the big events and the little events. And I've also thrown in TCR International - whilst it's a touring car series, we're seeing a lot of them in GT series as classes now, so worth looking at.

And before the usual crew turn up and ruin this thread, I'll head off the usual remarks now. This thread is not for telling us how awful motorsport has become, or how terrible the ACO are, or how amazing DPis are and they should replace WEC because P1 is dead etc. We've got enough of that stuff in every other thread. This is just to see who is watching what.

[bentley speed 8]

I only watched the FIA WEC in the beginning. As I got more familiar with sportscars, I started watching ELMS, Blancpain Endurance and Sprint (only some races) and Super GT.
This year I am planning on adding a few more races, including Weathertech, Nurburgring 24h and other races in the Intercontinental GT Series. I hope my limited data connection can cope with it though....

I also have lost interest in single seaters. I just check the GP results to see who has won and move on from there.

[Rodger Davies]

I'm more about events on tracks that I enjoy, to be honest, but basically focus almost entirely on rallying and sportscars. I'll leave the rallying out of it.



Tier 1

Nurburgring 24 Hours
Spa 24 Hours
Le Mans 24 Hours
Bathurst 12 Hours



Tier 2

Sebring 12 Hours
Petit Le Mans
IMSA Laguna Seca
BES Monza



Tier 3

Watkins Glen 6 Hours
WEC Spa
BES Paul Ricard
Daytona 24 Hours



Probably missed some that will come back to me, but that's a vague idea. I don't really have that much interest in championships and for many series that's all it seems to be about, especially in single seaters. The final F1 race last year is the only one I've watched for years, and that was only the closing because it sounded tactically intriguing.

[Juntos]

With some much good offer out there, how da hell can someone spend time watching 24HSERIES? That is a series for Sunday drivers (without offence). That is like eating pumpkin macaron on Thanksgiving...

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by Juntos

With some much good offer out there, how da hell can someone spend time watching 24HSERIES? That is a series for Sunday drivers (without offence). That is like eating pumpkin macaron on Thanksgiving...

It can be very relaxing to watch, and almost old-school in a way. Don't get me wrong, I love WEC, IMSA and Blancpain and I do enjoy the professionalism. But sometimes it is a little sad that reliability is so good, and the teams are so professional that there's no difference between them. Watching Creventic can be like a throwback to the old days, when it was less professional and there were more variables involved.

I watched the 12 hours of the Red Bull Ring today and it was nice. There were some cars in that which you wouldn't get anywhere else, and some struggling with reliability and engineering problems - throwing smoke out the back when changing gear etc. It was nice because it wasn't WEC or IMSA. It was proper motorsport fans trying their best.

Some of the Creventic classes can be professional though. Any series that has works Audis and Bernd Schneider involved are getting pretty serious

[Victor_RO]

Besides oddball entries in terms of cars, you also get teams from places you wouldn't expect trying to make their start in endurance racing. At Mugello a Romanian team with 3 Romanian drivers ran a nearly-stock Toyota GT86, in probably the first occasion that a Romanian team has run in endurance racing. And given the flag next to my profile, you can guess that captured my interest.

[Hawkwood]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

It can be very relaxing to watch, and almost old-school in a way. Don't get me wrong, I love WEC, IMSA and Blancpain and I do enjoy the professionalism. But sometimes it is a little sad that reliability is so good, and the teams are so professional that there's no difference between them. Watching Creventic can be like a throwback to the old days, when it was less professional and there were more variables involved.

I watched the 12 hours of the Red Bull Ring today and it was nice. There were some cars in that which you wouldn't get anywhere else, and some struggling with reliability and engineering problems - throwing smoke out the back when changing gear etc. It was nice because it wasn't WEC or IMSA. It was proper motorsport fans trying their best.

For me, I love the amateur element. I love sport for the sake of sport, amateurs living their dream.

[TzeiTzei]

F1 above everything else. Then WEC, IMSA and Blancpain.

[S griffin]

I love the BTCC of course and the fact that the people who are in the series are not the same as everyone else who race in the world

I just want to say that the best thing about the world championship is that the people who are in the sport are in it to be the best

I just hope that the people who are in the World Endurance are not going to be anywhere else in the world as the series is the best thing about sportscar racing

[August]

I follow the FIA WEC and IMSA WeatherTech. I prefer the WEC as a championship, though IMSA's usual 2h40min race format in the European evening is actually better for me than WEC's 6 hours mostly in the afternoon or morning.

I don't really have the time to follow other series as closely, I'll watch occasionally Blancpain, VLN, ELMS, or PWC. I'd like to follow Super GT more closely but I'm not a morning guy.

In general, I follow sportscar racing more because of certain races: Nürburgring, Spa, and Bathurst are more important for me than regular WEC/IMSA rounds even though I don't follow the GT3 series quite so closely otherwise.

[Aysedasi]

Le Mans, WEC and occasionally some ELMS. That's all I need.

[MaskedRacer]

I did not put WEC and Le Mans 24 hours on there because of the lack of replays for it. If the WEC had a online subscription for a PC that has replays that would be a different story. The state of my life is that I cant sit around and watch things live for multiple hours straight. Just barely got through the 1 hour 40 minute Long Beach race.

Therefore the places that has good youtube replays up gets my viewing the most. IMSA obviously takes it there. But so does Blancpain GT. I also like less covered GT racing like Australian GT, GT Open (back from the dead maybe), and ADAC GT Masters.

Favorite endurance race is the 24 hours of Daytona

[MaskedRacer]

Originally Posted by TzeiTzei

F1 above everything else. Then WEC, IMSA and Blancpain.

F1?! Yuk. No way.

[fieldodreams79]

LM
IMSA (all but I neglected to select excluding big events, my pea brain was confused this morning)
PWC
Ring 24


Missing Bathurst 12 from the list for me. I add that to my vote.

[Lagunaseca_4life]

Everything Imsa
Le Mans
WEC
Bathurst 12h,spa 24h,ring 24h.
F1
Indy car
PWC
NASCAR
Nhra

[chunder]

Lots of things aswell as the odd sportscar race!

[TF110]

Le Mans, WEC, SUPER GT, Weather Tech, F1, WRC and Nascar are what I follow. I watch a lot of the other stuff but it's hard to get into with the lack of coverage and timing schedule here in the U.S.

[Mechanic Z]

Pirell World Challenge is the only series I really follow super regularly these days. I watch Blancpain Endurance and Sprint when I can. Usually catch the Nurburgring 24. Would probably watch the Spa 24 but haven't for quite a while, because it seems to always clash with the PWC races at Mid-Ohio, which I've attended the last two years.

Surprised not to see the Bathurst 12 Hour on the poll; it's become one of the events I look forward to watching every year.

So:
Pirelli World Challenge
Blancpain Endurance
Blancpain Sprint
Nurburgring 24
Bathurst 12

[Akrapovic]

Leaving Bathurst off was a complete oversight from me. When I was making the list I remembered bathurst whilst listing Australian GT and then I completely forgot to add it.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

Leaving Bathurst off was a complete oversight from me. When I was making the list I remembered bathurst whilst listing Australian GT and then I completely forgot to add it.

It might be a bit late, but I've added

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by Adam43

It might be a bit late, but I've added

Thanks for adding that!

Some interesting results so far.

ELMS is not as popular as I expected, but the Michelin Le Mans Cup is completely unpopular. It's a series run for the drivers and teams rather than fans so it doesn't matter, but I expected a slightly higher number for that. Maybe it'll improve with LMP3 in the show.

Asian Le Mans Series I'm sure would be more popular if the coverage was better. But I've tried it twice and once it had no commentators and once it had only 2 or 3 cameras. Proper coverage would help it.

I expected IMSA to be up with WEC, but it's a little behind. But then again IMSA has just gone through a major overhaul, so it'll be trending upwards I'm sure.

Blancpain Endurance Series firmly beats the Sprint Series, despite the Sprint Series now having the factory teams. Maybe the idea that peoples attention spans are too short for endurance racing just doesn't wash. We're sitting here with a (very unscientific) poll of hardcore motorsport fans who want to see Endurance racing over Sprint racing. But then again maybe that's because of the audience polled.

Nurburgring 24 is more popular than the Span 24, despite VLN scoring far less than Blancpain. So that big event is worth a lot to VLN. I hope VLNs numbers rise now we have good English coverage of it.

ADAC GT Masters scores highly for a national series. It isn't massive but it's good. Unlike GT Open which is lower than I expected.

Pirelli World Challenge scores a lot lower than I expected. I expected that to be nearish to IMSA, but it doesn't even meat the Continental Tyre votes. We get a lot of PWC Traffic, so I guess the PWC fans are just passionate and like talking about their series.

Interesting stuff. Biggest surprises for me are ELMS and PWC being low numbers.

[Matt]

Gotta love the people listing non-sportscar series in a sportscar specific thread.

I watch IMSA religiously. We all know this.

I'll catch parts of Le Mans, WEC if there's nothing else to do(rainy day replay or something), Super GT is easy as there's only 8 rounds, so I'll watch one on the Sunday following the live-air. PWC when I can.

[fieldodreams79]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

Leaving Bathurst off was a complete oversight from me. When I was making the list I remembered bathurst whilst listing Australian GT and then I completely forgot to add it.

I demand a recount.

[MaskedRacer]

Originally Posted by Matt

Gotta love the people listing non-sportscar series in a sportscar specific thread.

I watch IMSA religiously. We all know this.

I'll catch parts of Le Mans, WEC if there's nothing else to do(rainy day replay or something), Super GT is easy as there's only 8 rounds, so I'll watch one on the Sunday following the live-air. PWC when I can.

Agreed IMSA certainly number 1. Blancpain GT is number 2 for me.

[TF110]

Originally Posted by Matt

Gotta love the people listing non-sportscar series in a sportscar specific thread.

I watch IMSA religiously. We all know this.

I'll catch parts of Le Mans, WEC if there's nothing else to do(rainy day replay or something), Super GT is easy as there's only 8 rounds, so I'll watch one on the Sunday following the live-air. PWC when I can.

The thread title is what series do you watch. It doesn't say what sportscar series do you watch.