178 MILLION VIEWERS WATCH THE TORINO WINTER OLYMPICS ON THE NETWORKS OF NBC UNIVERSAL

178 MILLION VIEWERS WATCH THE TORINO WINTER OLYMPICS ON THE NETWORKS OF NBC UNIVERSAL

NBC Wins 3rd Consecutive Friday, on Pace to Win 3rd Consecutive Week in Primetime

TORINO, Italy - Feb. 25, 2006 � Through the second week of the Torino Winter Games, 178 million total, unduplicated viewers have watched the Olympics on the networks of NBC Universal, according to fast national data from Nielsen Media Research. 40 million total, unduplicated viewers watched Friday as U.S. skier Julia Mancuso won the gold in the women's giant slalom, becoming the first American woman to win an Olympic alpine skiing medal since Picabo Street's gold in the Super-G at the Nagano Games in 1998.

- NBC DOMINATES PRIMETIME WITH 40 MILLION VIEWERS: NBC's Friday night coverage of the Torino Winter Olympics attracted 40 million total, unduplicated viewers. NBC's Friday night coverage drew a 9.7 household rating and 17 share for the program (8:30-11:23 p.m. ET/PT). NBC's Olympics coverage dominated the competition, with a 9.8 HH rating in primetime (8:30-11 p.m. ET/PT), and averaged 16.1 million viewers in primetime, more than five times greater than Fox (3.2M) and beating both ABC and CBS by 73 percent (9.3M).

- NBC ON PACE TO WIN 3RD STRAIGHT WEEK IN PRIMETIME: Through 15 days, NBC's Torino Winter Olympics coverage is averaging 20.8 million viewers in primetime, more than double CBS's delivery (9.7M), up 87 percent over ABC (11.1M) and 75 percent above Fox (11.9M), and is on pace to win its third consecutive week in primetime in household ratings and viewer delivery.

- NBC's OLYMPICS COVERAGE DOUBLES NORMAL VIEWER DELIVERY: Friday night's delivery of 16.1 million viewers in primetime more than doubled its usual viewer delivery in primetime (7.7M), and the 9.8 HH rating is 85 percent higher than its underlying Friday primetime average rating (5.3).

- NBCU CABLE: Through Friday, the Olympics on the cable networks of NBC Universal have reached 61.1 total, unduplicated viewers, up 19 percent from Feb. 2005 (51.4 million) and up 34 percent from the same point during the Salt Lake Games (45.6 million). CNBC's weekday curling coverage, 5-8 p.m. ET following "Closing Bell," is averaging 876,000 total viewers, up 579 percent from Feb. 2005 (129,000); The Olympics on MSNBC are averaging 442,000 total viewers up 123 percent compared to Feb. 2005 time periods (198,000).

- SASHA COHEN LEADS ATHLETE TRAFFIC ON NBCOLYMPICS.COM: NBCOlympics.com has recorded 338 million page views to date, more than doubling the total number of page views from the Salt Lake Winter Games, with more than 22 million page views on Friday alone. More than 8.2 million videos have been streamed on the web site to date, equaling 103,000 hours of video. Through Friday, Sasha Cohen leads all athlete traffic on NBCOlympics.com. Following are the top ten trafficked athletes on the web site:
1. Sasha Cohen
2. Shaun White
3. Tanith Belbin
4. Emily Hughes
5. Apolo Anton Ohno
6. Gretchen Bleiler
7. Kimmie Meissner
8. Chad Hedrick
9. Cassie Johnson
10. Bode Miller

THE OLYMPICS IN PRIMETIME ON NBC

Friday Torino to Date through Fri., Feb. 24
HH Rating 9.7/17 12.5/20
A18-49 4.4 6.3
Average Viewers 15.9 20.8
Total Unduplicated 40 million 178 million

The networks of NBC Universal, NBC, USA, MSNBC, CNBC, NBC HD and Universal HD are providing more than 418 total hours of coverage � including the most live coverage � across the most platforms of any Winter Olympics in history of the XX Olympic Winter Games from Torino, Italy, Feb. 10-26.