RISI speaks on the lack of TV coverage

http://www.risicompetizione.net/?p=727

 

He must have been whispering> 404 | The page you are looking for does not exist.
CH

 

I think this is it: http://www.risicompetizione.net/?p=678

 

That's not it. The blog post referred to has been removed - supposedly at the request of the American Le Mans Series management.
The full text has been preserved at several sports-car racing blogs / forums and should not be hard to find.

 

"Marshall McLuhan, the brilliant professor, media sage and pop culture icon, pegged it correctly in the sixties when he pointed out that when content is communicated via media, two messages are actually sent. The first message is the content itself–news, sports, drama, data–and the second message is the medium through which this content is transmitted to the market and/or audience. McLuhan believed that the selection of the medium is actually just as important or more important than the message itself.

All communications is a combination of content and context: in other words, what you say and how you say it. Sometimes, the content is brilliant but the context in which it is presented is not and, of course, frequently the opposite is true–a brilliant context but lacking in content. The best communications has both, i.e. The Taschen book on Muhammed Ali that is bigger than life; the simple but frightfully competent premise of the iPod; the great Kubrick film 2001; Philip Johnson’s austere but complex Glass House; Ryan Shaw’s screaming, sweating, hip-shaking version of “Searching for a Love”. You get the idea: good stuff done right.

Thinking about media and its impact is something of no small importance in professional level sporting activities. Professional level implies a high degree of proficiency–theoretically in all areas of the sport–and excellence is expensive, in any endeavor. Professional sport is a message on multiple levels: there is the competition message; the interpersonal message; the dramatic message; the communications message and, increasingly the commercial message.

So it is with sports car racing, which has a very high commitment and financial burn rate for the participants that should be matched by a similar level of commitment and investment on the part of the promoting and sanctioning bodies. Together, we’ll reach the top, should be the attitude.

This has the appearance of not being the case with the ALMS . And it possibly seemed more apparent with this past weekend’s non-media telecast of the 12 Hours of Sebring.

The major international race of the American Le Mans Series was not telecast live on broadcast television (cable, satellite, over-the-air, major network, minor network, two-guys-and-a-cooler-with-a-handicam network). It was nowhere to be found on your cable box, gone, disappeared, adioski. On Saturday morning, The Racing Bunker phone lines were jammed with fans asking, basically, “Where’s the beef?”, i.e. what channel is the race telecast on?

I had the distinctly unpleasant duty of informing our fans that, well, gosh, the ALMS, out-in-front-of-racing trends with Green Racing and pitching the idea of a Tech Savy series to sponsors…well, they don’t have a “real” TV deal this year. But you can catch the 12 Hours of Sebring, our crown jewel, on the Internet, at ESPN3.Com. Oh, and one other thing–the highlight reel is on the Alphabet Network (ABC), the same network that brought us the wonderful “Wide World of Sports” series and Roone Arledge and the isolated camera and instant reply, all of which is great and mega and trend-setting, but it’s on Sunday afternoon, after the race is won and done that situation is not great, mega or trend-setting. The Sebring telecast on ABC (and yet another replay on ESPN2) was an hour and a half. The race was 12 hours. Do the math and you understand, yet again, how the medium is the message and the message, this year is that the ALMS is now disappearing from the mainstream sports landscape.

There will be plenty of people who will say the streaming internet coverage of Sebring was just fine and, technically, it was just fine. Just. Fine. And invisible. And small. And diminished in grandeur and scale and importance.

There is nothing wrong with internet television coverage as an element of a cohesive media strategy and it may very well be the way all television is delivered in five or ten years. But there is something very, very wrong with internet being the only form of live coverage for this race and this series. It is a demotion and a very public one.

At this stage in the development of the new world of digital communications, the internet should be the bonus round, additional coverage that augments the main television broadcast. It’s an add-on, but it is not yet a strong enough medium to be the ONLY channel. And, if your ISP doesn’t offer up ESPN3.com, you are out of luck. Last year, I applauded the forward thinking of adding internet coverage to the weekend’s media coverage menu, and particularly liked having qualifying coverage available over the internet, which made it very easy to catch sitting at your office desk. But I viewed those initiatives as an add-on, not main stream because an internet telecast just doesn’t send the right message to enough people to really make an impact.

A look at the American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patron Schedule of coverage reveals the 2011 media strategy:

Qualifying is available on ESPN3.com for each ALMS race. That’s good.

Live race coverage is available on ESPN3.com. That’s not so good.

Broadcast race coverage is time delayed for each race, broadcast either via ABC or ESPN2 (both networks are owned by Disney) and while the ALMS may rejoice in the brand names that are covering the series, the key problem is that’s it all after-the-fact coverage. The results will be known, the drama ended. News and sports events are at their most powerful and relevant when broadcast live. Do you want to see the NCAA Final 4 live or via tape delay? The time-delay sports broadcast is an also ran, especially to the enthusiast.

“Sports on television is live television, it is history in the making, it is being “up close and personal” (again, thanks to ABC) as possibly momentous events unfold. To thrill in the victory of a favorite, to join the excitment of the moment in an exhilarating game or to learn more about the teams, players or games on television are among possible satisfactions that are obviously specific to sports on television.”

–From an article on Sports and Television, written by Stanley J. Baran, from Museum of Modern Broadcasting web site.

Last year, ALMS had a commendably adventurous broadcast media strategy. They brought the internet into play for qualifying. Good move. They had radio deals with Satellite radio and over the internet with Le Mans radio. Another good move. They had same day coverage of most races with Speed and for those that they didn’t broadcast live, they took a creative chance and brought in a top documentary team (the group that did the great Audi documentary on Le Mans, Truth in 24) and pushed around the edges of the sport a little bit, turning the time-delay coverage into more of a feature and less of a highlight film. That was all good and I enthusiastically endorsed the strategy and the risk-taking behind it. They made the best of a difficult situation.

I don’t see that happening this year, as the number of channels of race coverage have been diminished by precisely 50% and there doesn’t seem to be much enthusiasm for innovation in the way races are covered. Famed broadcaster Eric Severeid once said that “Dealing with television executives is like being nibbled to death by ducks”, so maybe it’s harder to strike a great deal than ever before, but how can that be, with so many channels available and so little original programming to fill them?

Importantly, one of the major non-tv channels cut from this year’s media program was the only truly mobile one: satellite radio. Wi-Fi will certainly one day make it possible for you to take your sports coverage–audio or video– with you but it’s just not there yet. Fans on the road during races loved to listen to live Satellite coverage of the races but that opportunity will not, to my knowledge, be available this year.

Against the shrinking media presence of the American Le Mans Series lies another giant problem: sponsorship visibility. Start, first, with the disappearance of live race day coverage on broadcast TV (defined for the purposes of this article as television via cable, satellite, or over-the-air terrestrial broadcast). The medium is the message and the message to sponsors and advertisers is…..let’s get small. You have a big brand but it’s being showcased not through a broadcast TV pipe but a laptop straw. As a brand manager, you paid big money for exposure; maybe track presence and next-day coverage is going to be OK with you. But perhaps not, and if not, you can expect sponsors and advertisers to vote with their checkbooks. Without that same day live broadcast coverage, things just don’t look pro, do they?

Team owners and managers may also be counted amongst the disgruntled. Sports car racing is brutally expensive and even when you bring your “A” game to the track, race after race, there is no guarantee that someone won’t take you out of the race early on, as happened with the Extreme Sports Ferrari 458 at Sebring. Exposure is one of the key benefits of the sport and there is a message in when and via what medium that exposure is accessed. The race experience, at the track, in the pits, will remain huge and unique and involving, but the reach of live competition is shorter now, the drama evacuated from the race, via time shifting for broadcast TV and video compression down to internet broadcast requirements for online.

The announcers for the internet TV coverage and radio coverage were good, the direction of the show was professional, but the audience was just too small. Fans and manufacturers and sponsors want a bigger, more dynamic stage. There is always the possibility that the current ALMS media program will prove a huge winner, that the demographics will be great, and that the tape-delay broadcasting highlight films will draw an even bigger audience than did last year’s telecasts on Speed, although that possibility took a huge hit when ABC’s next day coverage disappeared from the West Coast TV schedule. The ALMS feels all is well and just released a press notice that said that viewership was three times larger than last year, but the release was without breakouts per channel and no one knows whether it was the same audience watching the same thing three times, or people checking in and out of the online stream, with each checkin counted as a “unique visitor”.

Sports is based on competition and this competition is extant at every level: on the field, between players and coaches and owners and teams and leagues. So how competitive is the ALMS in the modern era? Has the series truly raised its profile vis a vis the competition?

In 2005, NASCAR signed an eight year broadcasting deal with Fox/Speed Channel, ABC/ESPN, and TNT to cover the Sprint Cup, the Nationwide Series and the Camping World Truck Series.

The value of the contract is $4.8 billion. In other words, The Big Time.

IndyCar (now the Izod IndyCar series) has a major deal with Versus, the sports network for Comcast (which now owns NBC). This deal will provide IndyCar with a solid broadcast platform with 10 races broadcast live this year (plus the Indy 500, which currently runs on ABC). After a lot of searching, I was able to put a number to the value of the IndyCar TV deal, which was signed in 2008: $40 million over 10 years. That number will probably rise as media sports values typically go up over time. Versus is owned by Comcast, which owns NBC, so it will only be a matter of time before Versus becomes the NBC Sports Channel or something like it, an ESPN competitor, which will bring increased exposure and big-network prestige. Lurking around the corner for IndyCar are the same issues facing ALMS –ratings or the lack thereof–but at least IndyCar has something to build ratings on (for the TV ratings enthusiasts out there, a rating of 1.0 would be very good for most racing shows and IndyCar has pulled ratings inthe .3 or .4 range. By contrast, NASCAR delivers ratings in the 4.0 range: the most recent Daytona 500 race delivered a 5.3 overnight, up 6% from last year).

In short, the lack of a live telecast partner is not a good sign for the ALMS brand. The series is going backwards in terms of media exposure at precisely the wrong time. Is ALMS management up to the task of making the type of big time business and media deals that can revitalize the public presence and image of the series? They’re going to have be a lot more aggressive and think a lot more creatively to do so … and we support them and do hope so."

 

Thanks Stig! That's the exact post! I guess ALMS was quickly thin skinned when they saw it and had it taken down faster than a pole qualifying lap!

 

Tony Dowe response to the RISI flap:

http://lastturnclub.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=767&Itemid=51

 

Now let's see if they are thin skinned enough to penalize Risi for speaking out. I'm too lazy to look it up so I can quote it but there is a section of the rule book that says competitors can be penalized for criticizing IMSA / ALMS.

 

Saw that last night, there's another one on autoguide.com and one on dailysportscar.com. Plus a couple of threads on almsfans.com.

 

Maybe they should just shutup and race?
Since when did being on TV make you faster?

 

My cable company does not carry ESPN3.com, so I watched the alternate coverage, the hour-and-a-half infomercial (which is what this telecast was to me), the next day on ABC.

If I was a team or series sponsor, I would be pretty upset about not having a decent TV package. I wonder if this new coverage arrangement was shared with the sponsors before they committed their funds to the series...

 

When it provided the sponsor $$$ necessary for little things like, oh I don't know, spare motors, transportation, research & development, etc.

It's a shocking disgrace that series champions Highcroft Racing don't have a main sponsor and can't commit even to Le Mans when they've been invited.

 

As a Team Principal you are responsible to your sponsors, for their investment in you.
And it's serious money......

He is spot on.

TV is TRYING to do the same "cutting edge tech crap" that radio has done...

But guess what?

There's MILLIONs more households in America with TVs and radios than there are "cutting edge streaming downloads to a flat screen 57" monitor".

So, the ALMS has shot themselves in the azz, unless they want to be "famous" with a handful of Tech Dweebs.

I back Mr. Risi 1000%, and not just because he throws a GREAT party! LOL!

The fragmentation and egos involved in media have torn the market to shreads.
(I have worked with FOX News at the multi million dollar level, and they think they are the end all be all, massive egos in the room.)

I still had the fastest car parked in the lot......

 

Of course not, they think they are dealing with "professionals" and instead they end up with 'has been rock stars' running the show....

Oh, wait.....that's the IRL.......

I miss Chris Economaki.........

 

My apologies to any of you that actually ARE Tech Dweebs and have a system like that.....I know my friend Stackhouse does..

He was watching movies on the side of his house, from skinny dipping in the pool the other night.....LOL!

None of that fancy stuff, in ol' Tex's dome tent, out on the range.....we just have stars.

 

I was waiting for somebody to say that, thank you.
Being on TV does not directly give you money, being on the right channel at the right time gives you ratings, which some folks think means more money, but most teams know what the TV packages are before they even start the season, they have to so they can communicate that to their sponsors.

I don't think I'd race in a series that COUNTED ON TV for exposure.
It's nice to have, it's even a necessity, but if it isn't there, then don't race, as hard as it is to say that.

Hell, the Daytona 500 winner cannot afford to drive in all the races.

I blame TV - which attracts high-dollar owners, which then attract high-dollar sponsors, which then want top finishes, which then means more skilled labor on the team, kinda like, oh, I don't know, any top F1 team, any top nascar team, any top team in any motorsports.
Pretty soon you have priced everyone out of the sport.

Does anyone remember when Williams was a consistent, legit TOP team? For awhile it was Mclaren-Williams, now Williams is lucky to be a top-6 team IF THAT.
They had TOP sponsors, now they don't, look where they are.

 

You're a little behind the times, Gene Simmons' group is not doing IRL anymore, I don't believe.

 

I just got the email.....

They want you to BUY the race coverage, 3 DVDs for $35.......

THERE"S a good business plan......WTF?????

 

I have to hand crank my record player......LOL!

I do need to stop by and chew the fat with A.J.

Was flying down the road by his shop the other day, but didn't have time to stop and chat.
The lights were on at sundown and the doors were all up, that means they are "getting ready"!

 

RISI response to the fury:
http://www.risicompetizione.net/?p=744

 

Thanks!!!

I posted a comment..LOL!

*Awaiting moderation*