Correspondent

The Eagle has been wounded.

In its Arbitron rating performance debut – for the winter period – upstart radio station WUSH-FM US106, America’s Country, did more than make inroads against well-established country music format competitor WGH-FM 97.3 The Eagle.

US106 appears to be driving away with a chunk of the Eagle’s listenership.

“We figured they would,” John Shomby, operations manager and program director for the Eagle, said Wednesday. “There were no surprises. When you have two country stations, there’s a choice.”

Sinclair Communications, which owns WUSH, turned out the light on pop-hits station Energy 106.1, flipping formats by formally hopping back into country music with the launch of US 106 in December.

“In the various demographics, we had huge increases,” said Jay Michaels, program and operations director for US106. “These are great debuts for us.”

As an example, in the midday time slot for listeners ages 18-34, US106 entered with a seventh-place ranking, but what is more striking is Eagle 97 fell from second place to tenth. By going country, Sinclair more than doubled its ratings.

That’s big news for ad agencies, because Arbitron ratings are used by advertisers to determine a radio station’s strength in listenership.

For three years, Eagle has been unopposed in the country format. It still enjoys a more powerful broadcast signal than WUSH, but with a pending FCC ruling that could soon change.

“We think we can beat Eagle,” said Sinclair Communications CEO Bob Sinclair. “We can’t do it until we get the power increase, but we’re truly pleased and very confident.”

Shomby said 97.3 The Eagle will bounce back.

“This is a marathon, not a sprint,” he said.

Elsewhere, for the third consecutive quarter, R&B 95.7, WVKL-FM, continued to dominate in the overall category for persons 12 and above.

Jeff Maisey at (757) 222-3934 or jmaisey@pilotonline.com