Deutsche Telekom

ARD sport documentaries; strong ratings for F1, DTM, Tour

German broadcaster ARD announced two new sports documentary series that will be released in its Mediathek in August: "RIDE. Reitsport zwischen Wettkampf, Glamour und Tierwohl" on August 8 and "Fight House – Der Weg zum MMA-Profi" on August 11, plus a new episode of "Die Derbys" from August 28. MagentaTV ended its World Cup morning show "Breakfast Club" and continues to feature Jürgen Klopp as an on-air expert. Streaming sports operator DAZN has struck a partnership with WSC Group to show the Kumho FIA TCR World Tour globally (free in most markets, excluding China, South Korea and Hungary) for the 2026 season. Broadcasters reported solid audience figures: the Tour de France stage drew 1.24 million on ARD and 320,000 on Eurosport; ProSieben’s DTM coverage reached about 470,000 viewers (9.2% in ages 14–49); Sky’s F1 Silverstone race averaged roughly 740,000 viewers with a 16.4% share in the 14–49 demo.

World Cup Drives kicker to Digital Traffic Records

MEEDIA reports that sports publisher kicker recorded a digital traffic record in June 2026: 321.68 million visits across its website and app, surpassing its previous record of 317 million (EM 2024). The publisher also reported 125.1 million video views across kicker properties and social channels in June, a jump of over 30 million versus the prior record. Instagram activity for kicker reached 381 million content plays in June, with 11.9 million unique users and 126,000 comments; Facebook showed 1.2 million interactions and 9.2 million video plays. kicker says kicker+ subscription sign-ups hit their strongest month since the pay offering began in 2024. The publisher attributes gains largely to World Cup attention and time-zone-driven morning consumption patterns, plus highlights acquired from Magenta TV.

RTL and Sky Reveal New Programming and Ad Plans

At the Screenforce Festival RTL presented its programming and commercial strategy, stressing live sports, events and reality formats to compete with large streaming services. The broadcaster highlighted rights and distribution for premium sports (Formula 1, Europa League and other football properties) and entertainment plans including a new run of the game show Gladiators (a co-production with Prime Video) and refreshed German-language fiction based on classics. The presentation followed RTL’s recent integration of Sky assets and emphasised a cross-platform offer across linear TV and streaming to grow ad contacts and monetisable premium inventory for advertisers.