TV Overnights: Grand National wins a high of 8.7m viewers

BBC One’s Grand National coverage peaked with a high of more than 8.7 million viewers on Saturday afternoon.

The Aintree races pulled in over 3.1 million average viewers and a 35.8% audience share from 1pm onwards, but Ballabriggs’ big win in the 4.15pm banked the top ratings of the day.

Sporting events dominated this weekend’s schedule, particularly for BBC One. The channel also scored a high of 2.6 million viewers for the Formula 1: The Malaysian Grand Prix Qualifying race on Saturday morning and 1.3 million peak viewers for Football Focus at lunch time.

In the evening slot, Match of the Day peaked with 3.7 million viewers. Meanwhile, on Sunday, the second race of the Grand Prix season attracted more than 4.3 million viewers.

On BBC Two, the European Championships Artistic Gymnastics picked up 511,000 average viewers on Sunday afternoon, while Live Golf: The Masters hit a high of 3.5 million viewers in the Sunday evening slot.

However, ITV1 did get a look in – the film premiere of Mamma Mia! with Meryl Streep, Julie Walters and Colin Firth banked the top ratings on Saturday night with a high of 5.8 million viewers.

The all new When Piers Met (Andrew Lloyd Webber) series followed with 3.5 million peak viewers to claim the Saturday evening peak-hour ratings.

On Sunday, ITV1 secured the peak audience on and off during the afternoon line-up until the second episode of Lewis, which won the top ratings for almost an hour from 8pm. The crime drama pulled in over 5.5 million peak viewers and a 21.2% average share.

However, BBC One’s popular Waking the Dead took over at 9pm with 5.2 million viewers and a 20.6% share.

Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.