Launched about a month ago, it brings together six channels and 92 videos published until the middle of last week, in a format reminiscent of Youtube. In the sidebar, the categories NASCAR CUP, NASCAR XFINITY and NASCAR TRUCK are highlighted.
Grand Prix, Motorsport Brazil and Speed World are the main partners, integrated into the PicPay and Nascar agreement for the online racing transmission by the end of 2027.
The contract marks the return of US stages to Brazilian screens since 2024. Pictv will display the remaining 35 races of the three divisions. The big prize, for example, secured the 14 final events of Cup Series, starting with the short oval of Iowa, played on the last day 3.
Continues after advertising
The entry of the Digital Bank was released as a marketing action in motorsport, but little was said about the creation of the platform itself. A Brazilian financial sector brand has decided to build their own streaming service to convey one of the most valuable sports properties in the world, and, in breach, add niche media to expand range.
While PicPay tries to revive the free sport model, offering pictv races at no direct cost to the public, Nascar Global is already in a fragmented ecosystem, in line with major alloys and elite events.
The new contract, in force from this year, yields US $ 1.1 billion annually on rights distributed between open transmission (FOX, NBC), cable TV (TNT SPORTS) and streaming (Amazon). It is the standard formula of the industry: multiple sources of revenue, but a product dispersed on various platforms.
Continues after advertising
Like the Puck News At the end of May, the doubt still hangs whether the public will agree to migrate between screens, whether the multiplicity of formats and channels does not harm loyalty, or if it doesn’t even matter in the face of the decay of linear TV.
First test at Prime Video
Nascar’s debut at Amazon Prime Video in May served as a thermometer to measure public appetite. According to Puck NewsCoke 600 registered an average of 2.72 million viewers per minute, below Fox’s 3.1 million in 2024 and away from 3.9 million from 2022.
Amazon pointed out that its audience was six years younger (56 years against 62 on open TV), but, as Fox Sports’s Mike Mulvihill mounted, “it’s easy to look younger when you lose five older spectators for each younger you earn.”
Continues after advertising
John Herbst, from Nascar, classified the numbers as “encouraging” by representing an explicit request for the fan change. Prime’s young base was another positive point: the 18-54 -year -old lanes had the highest rates outside the open TV since 2022.
Journalist Brian Thornsburg Signals more optimistic: the peak of 2.92 million and the average 2.62 million exceeded recent evidence broadcast by Fox Sports on cable TV. For him, intermediate races could migrate to streaming, reducing dependence on pay TV.
The requirement would be to centralize all the content in one place, today spread between Fox, NBC, uses Network, Prime and TNT, which makes the life of the American fan more expensive.
Continues after advertising
The case echoes what happened at NFL: Natal Games broadcast by Netflix by 2024 attracted 24.3 million viewers to Ravens × Texans, but there was still more than 20% drop over the previous year.
Among TV executives, it is estimated that large events lose about 20% of the audience when migrating to streaming. The question is what happens to less iconic events, such as a Nascar race in the middle of May.
The dilemma of fragmentation
Thornsburg argues that the numbers point to an inevitable path: Nascar should embrace streaming as the main channel. Its proposal: Focus the regular season on digital platforms, leaving the opening and closing steps with FOX and NBC.
Continues after advertising
In the journalist’s view, the flow would be more logical: casual fans would follow only the beginning and end; The dedicated, the whole season via streaming, including less popular circuits such as Pocono and Richmond. Flexibility would allow you to sign only during running months and cancel outside them, solving part of the current problem:
“Demand fans sign cable TV ($ 230/month) + sling ($ 45) + prime video just to follow a season is absurd,” he says.
The ideal model would be a unique hub, as WWE did when selling the Monday Night Raw For Netflix for $ 5.5 billion in 10 years.
Amazon, with rights of Thursday Night Football ($ 1 billion/year for 11 years), could be this home for Cup Series. For Thornsburg, the transition would require:
- Reduce the calendar from 36 to 26 races
- Create a more dynamic playoff system
- Integrate XFinity and Truck Series in the same package
Dispute for narrative and roots
In late July, Nascar for a new creative agency, according to the Ad Age. Tim Clark, brand director, admitted that efforts to attract young fans may have removed part of the historic base.
Now the goal is to “embrace the target audience more fully and at the same time engage new fans with authenticity. Repositioning coincides with the rise of nationalist feeling in the US, although Clark denies direct relationship with politics.
There are 11 agencies “in the race” for the contract, and the first job should debut in the 500 Daytona miles in February 2026. Clark summarizes: It’s time to “plant a flag and really mean who we are as a brand”.
Eye in Brazil
Interest in internationalizing is not empty speech. Commissioner Steve Phelps at the Nascar Brasil stage in Interlagos and told what I would like to bring Cup Series to the country.
“I would like this to happen [no Brasil]… It would be very excited, ”said Phelps.
Pictv, in this scenario, acts as a makeshift bridge:
- Pros: exposes the Nascar brand to a young and digital audience
- Contras: For now, it generates little recipe (limited AVod model) and does not solve fragmentation
Everything in one place
As observed the Entertainment Strategy Guy Earlier this year, the tension that moves sports streaming is the same as the entire TV: fans want the experience in a single platform, and companies want to be owned by this place. The logic of the cable TV package is repeated.
Nascar’s premiere at Prime shows that streaming begins to approach the range of linear TV at first -rate events. Jo Redfern, analyzing the recent movements of ITV and BBC to YouTube, recalls: young people do not watch open TV, but seek experiences on the big screen.
Youtube acts as a bridge, and transmedia strategies become mandatory. In Brazil, Pictv incorporates this logic by centralizing Nascar and niche partners into one environment, creating, for the first time, an exclusive platform for the local public.
The case reveals something that goes beyond motorsport: the transition to streaming does not guarantee the same recipe as the past, but it can open new doors to previously unreachable audiences, as long as they know exactly for those who are running.
