Khadijah Mellah and Deirdre lead to spike in ITV Goodwood viewing figures

The Khadijah Mellah fairytale in the Magnolia Cup and a first win at the meeting for Japan with Deirdre in the Nassau Stakes on Thursday helped ITV to a peak Goodwood audience of 794,000 over the five days.

The memorable Thursday outscored the traditional peak viewing day, Wednesday, as well as leaping above Saturday's viewing numbers.

ITV figures for the Thursday in the first two years since taking over coverage from Channel 4 averaged under 500,000 each time.

Deirdre: won the Nassau Stakes for JapanCredit: Edward Whitaker

But the two big stories at this year's meeting helped that number soar to 585,000 which in turn delivered the leading peak figure of the week.

That equated to a 10.3 per cent share of the viewing audience on Thursday afternoon, which was only topped by 10.4 per cent on Sussex Stakes day when the average was 579,000 with a peak of 727,000.

The Magnolia Cup attracted widespread national attention and although it was over before ITV came on air, it received significant coverage and is the most likely explanation for the spike in figures.

ITV's Oli Bell said: "The figures across the board are great and a vindication of a lot of people's hard work.

"All the stars aligned through the week with Frankie's winners, Khadijah's story and Deirdre for Japan and they have taken racing into different living rooms and brought new eyes to this fabulous sport.

Khadijah Mellah's Magnolia Cup triumph boosted television figuresCredit: Dan Kitwood (Getty Images)

"The power of some amazing stories has brought new eyes who will watch again," added Bell, who reported a growing audience for the Opening Show, continuing the trend for 2019.

This year's afternoon five-day figures for Goodwood show ITV has nearly doubled both its audience and the television audience share since succeeding Channel 4 three years ago.

The five-day average audience was 573,000 this year compared to 523,000 last year and 513,000 in 2017. This is a 9.5% increase from 2018 and 11.5% from 2017.

Peak numbers this year were around 755,000 and this was up nine per cent from 689,000 in 2018 and seven per cent from 705,000 in 2017.

The average audience share at 9.8 per cent compared to 9.1 last year and 7.6 per cent in 2017.

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