A note to CBS....

You Americans should pressure who ever your host broadcaster is to take a lesson from how we do our broadcasts here in Australia. We have our own local clowns introduce the race, talk about qualifying etc. then they pick up Britain's ITV commentry with Martin Brundle and James Allen. It's a heaps better system. I've been in the USA and watched F1 on tv there and yes, the commentry truely, truely sucked.

 

I think I know the people you're talking about! Is it channel 10? I watched some of their Monaco broadcast, it was just as bad, haha! Then they switched to ITV and I got really confused since I thought they would do it. On top of that, they switched to ITV with the guys already talking about the race. I didn't even know what they were referring to. At least you get ITV for the actual race, I think I could put with the pre and post race stuff on ch. 10

Edit: Is Leigh Diffy one of the hosts?

Edit #2: I take that back, it's not as bad as CBS. Not even close. CBS really sucks compared to ch.10. It's like they invented suck.

 

I think it was Graham Hill and Carlos Pace that died in airplane accidents. Jody Schecter is still alive, in Atlanta I think, operating some sort of spy equipment sales company, and watching his son Tomas in the IRL.

 

British GP on SpeedTV midnight, Friday, June 16.

 

no it was brutal and boring like imola just ask derek

 

At least you guys got to SEE it - they stuck 2 hours of infomercials on CBS here locally instead........ never saw a bit of it.

 

I disagree, if you watch nascar racing they don't talk down to the fans to get a few extra. A guy like Steve Matchett will explain first-hand what makes F-1 cars so extreme. Just my opinion. I'm not a fan of playing to the lowest common denominator. It's the reason so many of our children don't get the education they should.

 

You do know that no F1 races are filmed with HD cameras, don't you?

 

I haven't timed it, but it seems to me that CBS goes to commercial a lot more often than Speed as well. The race is almost unwatchable when they cover it. Although the points on it being better than no coverage are valid, there is a certain amount of attraction to the inaccesible. ie, a sense of mysticism when one has to wait anxiously, watching live-scoring online or trying to catch a news snippit on RAI (Italian news). This is lost entirely when the sport is dumbed down in a mass-appeal manner as done by CBS and their lackluster commentators.

 

Daly's favorite word seems to be "WOW". One time I heard him say it without and other comment. Just "Wow!"

He was very frank on his views of the MS Monaco screwup. Plus he threw in some other MS mishaps over the years.

 

Nit Picking a bit guys. As far as CBS goes it could have been worse. Boring ass race anyway.

 

I have timed it, sort of (while keeping track of laps). They both run two laps of commercials at about the same rate.

Both have an odd knack of going to commercials just in time for the pit stops (because nothing happens then, right?). Although Speed shows you replays of what happened while they were away, and CBS shows Sato pitting.

The CBS commercials seem so much worse, because the network commercials for "flog your roomate", or some such, are so obnoxious, compared to Speed channel commercials for car programs.

That was one good point about ABC's coverage of Indy: the picture-in-picture ("side by side" they called it) of the race during commercials.

 

Hi A1, yeah it is cannel 10 here and leigh diffy is one of the host. Yeah they do tend to swicth to ITV at some strange times. I guess I'm used to it. I think that our guys have a much better understanding of F1 than any US commentater I've heard all the same, even if they are a bit dumb sometimes they do try much harder. For the british gp this year they actually went to the race, broadcast live from the circuit and had some good pre race stories and interviews with the BAR team and Mark Webber. I can't knock them for trying to keep us informed back here.

 

Well, actually, I disagreee with your assessment. NASCAR does have a lot of info for the first time viewer. Cut away cars, behind the scenes views, etc. Their basic broadcast is easy to follow even if you have never watched NASCAR before. I would also suggest that the typical NASCAR audience that tunes in is much more knowledgeable about their sport, than the typical viewer of F1 on CBS. Of course the typical F1 viewer on SpeedTV is the most knowlegeable viewer of them all.

According to a recent article I read, there is a high percentage of first time viewers on CBS F1 broadcasts, that is the demographic they use to sell more commercials. If it were the same F1 fanatic tuning into CBS each of the four broadcasts as we have on SpeedTV, their audience numbers would not grow, their ad fees would be stagnant. Not what CBS has in mind.

Think about it, don't you realize that CBS has had complaints about the nature of their F1 commentary? Of course they have, but that is not the target audience they want. They figure the regular F1 fan will tune in anyway, its the virgin they want.

Besides, complain all we want, I am still thankful its on some network to watch the same day as the event takes place. Better than nothing I think.

 

Just so you know, over at the SpeedTV boards, one of the posters is the guy who does all the stats for both Speed and CBS, so some of the comments that get made over there get filtered through to the CBS producers.

From what I've gathered, they know they're rubbish compared to Speed.

Sadly, I took the wife to see Cars again yesterday, and when I got home I discovered that the TiVo had decided not to record the race. I managed to download the ITV feed, but not until around 1.30 am.

As an expat brit, I have been extolling the virtues of ITVs coverage, but I have to say, this last season, Speed have really come on leaps and bounds. Yes, they might only have Peter Windsor at the circuit, but I'd say their coverage is actually now the best I've seen.

 

around lap 9 before commercial brake.

Did they say "Jacques and Gilles Villeneuve are surely looking forward for the Canadian GP" ?

 

The problem as I see it is, the 'common' sports fan cannot identify with open-wheel racing anymore, and have not for 15 years.

For whatever reason, F1, IRL, CART don't have an american interest, and by that I mean, us 40+ folks grew up on AJ Foyt, Johnny Rutherford, Tom Sneva, an Unser or two, and we quite franky have not had that since Al Jr. and Michael retired 10+ years ago, or really 15 years ago when Rick Mears retired.

The facts are, if you ask someone about open wheel racing in the USA - specific to CURRENT drivers, you will be very lucky to hear any other name than Danica today, and that's just the way it is. You won't hear Paul Tracy, Dan Wheldon, Helio, Dario, or Michael, David, or Kimi, or Fernando.

On the other hand, you ask someone about nascar, you generally get 6-8 names thrown at you immediately.

I don't like it, we don't like it, but that's what we have to deal with.

 

Couldn't believe it when I heard it, either. That one *really* made me roll my eyes!

docster

 

Just watched Silverstone on CBS. I don’t understand a few things.
1. Is Takuma pronounced Takumo?
2. How is Gilles going to enjoy the race in Canada?
3. How hard is it to memorize which driver has the red or black paint so they can use the driver’s name? Hell, it isn’t hard to remember who is the number 1 driver for each team.

 

What I didn't understand was how Red Bull got a Ferrari V10 in the back of their car...as ponted out earlier.

Mark