Vintage Race Footage?

The earliest live broadcast of a Formula 1 race I can remember was the 1961 USGP at Watkins Glen on ABC's Wide World of Sports. I can still remember my disappointment when Phil Hill appeared as a commentator because Enzo had decided that since the championship had already been taken at Monza, there was no need to spend the money and effort to send the team to the US. Hill's disappointment at not racing as champion in his home country was palpable. I don't know if a copy exists, but I'd sure like to see it, if it does.

Jack

 

Are you sure it was WWoS? I thought the first appearance of F1 on the show was the 1962 Monaco GP. Time to dig out those old TV Guides!

T308

 

Absolutely certain that it was the 1961 USGP, which obviously predated the 1962 Monaco GP. Whether or not it was on WWoS, I'd say I'm 95% sure of that. I was 15 years old and anticipated the event for weeks. When the Ferrari team didn't show up it was a real let down for a race-starved teenager!

Jack

 

It may have been delayed. Most races were on WWoS in the early days. The 1962 Monaco GP was run on June 3 and aired on June 10, 1962. The 1965 Indy 500 didn't air until June 5th.

T308

 

I'm pretty sure it was live. ABC, quite rightly, went all-out, assuming that America's first world champion would be racing. In retrospect, I'm surprised that Hill agreed to be a part of the "broadcast team" given his well known (perhaps undeserved) reputation as being rather withdrawn and introspective, at least in those days.

Jack

 

That sounds like the correct date. Any luck with ABC?

Jack

 

You probably won't have much luck with ABC archives unless you have some inside connection. Of course if you made a formal call and offered to PAY for the video, I'm sure they would put somebody on the chase. I have e-mailed with a guy who has been involved with ABC sports for years. I was hoping to get a connection in their archives to located any available video of the 1967 LeMans race. (you know why). But I haven't heard back yet. Probably a lost cause. Networks are notorious for not really caring too much about OLD video. That's why Johnny Carson's earliest shows were recorded over. Nobody cared back then. I've also seen ABC use the same 10 second combat video in a dozen stories about the Vietnam war. The SAME guy limping toward a Huey helicopter. One would think that out of 10 years worth of war film, they could find something else. But the news editors on any particular day just use what is handy for a generic story. Unless it was actually broadcast LIVE, at the exact moment it was happening, something like an early 60s car race was probably shot on film and transferred to videotape for broadcast. And in 1961 the videotape would have been 2 inch quad head low band mono format. This is a totally dead dinosaur format today. Any videotapes in that format would have probably been transferred to a 1 inch format videotape in later years. And 1 inch is an dead format these days as well.

As a television videotape engineer for the past 24 years, I seriously wonder about the future of all videotape recordings that are buried away in network archives. With technology advancing so fast, there are VERY few of the early video recorders still in operating condition. Unless somebody maintains these beasts as a means to playback the old recordings, the day may come when the tapes may still exist but there will be no videotape recorders to play them back on. Much historical knowledge could be lost.

 

I received this reply from my connection to ABC:

"I am sorry to say they (ABC) no longer have any tapes or films from that long ago. I remember in the 1980s, ABC donated thousands of tapes to different museums all over the country. The department that did that has closed down."

So it looks like anybody searching for vintage racing footing will have to just "take a guess" as to which museum or archive center actually received any particular videotape, even if the desired race still existed in the first place. History scatters into the wind.

 

I'm a member of another forum with Michael Argetsinger, son of Watkins Glen guru Cameron Argetsinger. An historic archive has been established there. I'll contact Mike to see if he can help.

Why didn't I think of this before? (Don't answer that).

Jack

 

Sorry for the massive bump but maybe this interests someone.

First live F1 grand prix on television that is confirmed is the 1953 British Grand Prix which was shown segmented live on BBC. It is likely that the 1950 (and 1951 and 1952) race was shown in the same manner but I don't know about that for sure.

First live flag-to-flag broadcast is the 1960 Dutch Grand Prix, next one was the 1963 Italian Grand Prix on RAI. There are probably more but these two are confirmed by broadcast dates.

First flag-to-flag race that is available on DVD (altough not in a store) is the 1971 Italian Grand Prix from French TV. Superb slipstreaming at Monza!

It was very uncommon for sporting events to be shown live in full. Pretty much every European channel had a sports show (with pictures coming in from Eurovision) on saturday or sunday (BBC had Grandstand, ITV had World of Sport, etc) which showed segments of each sport live. Usually it was the start and the first 15-30 minutes for Formula 1, one or more sections in between and the last 15-30 minutes.

Belgian RTBF might have shown the 1963 Monaco Grand Prix for 5 hours straight (imagine watching that!) but the chances of seeing that must be close to zero...

First live broadcast by satellite was the 1965 Le Mans 24 Hours race. F1 races were shown quite delayed on US television, CBS showed the 1964 Watkins Glen race in late January! Altough, perhaps that is a rebroadcast?

Some say that the 1938 Donington Grand Prix was shown live on television but I don't think that will ever be confirmed, unless it was announced in a newspaper anywhere.

I have quite a lot of those old broadcasts, if anyone is interested send me a PM.

Mark

 

Grand Prix de Monaco 1960
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