The most popular yacht race in history - or "lies, damned lies and statistics"?

According to analysis carried out for the Volvo Ocean Race, the total cumulative TV audience for the last race will shortly reach 2 billion in 27 countries. I don’t understand how these viewing figures are arrived at, but to put it into perspective, the Athens Olympics recorded a total cumulative global TV audience just short of 4 billion.

Was the Volvo Ocean Race really viewed by half as many people as the last Olympic Games? It seems unlikely. But whatever the case, the VOR website offers a very different benchmark. It recorded 3.5 unique users during the course of the race.

What do you think? Did you watch the race on TV?