F1 going to Sky

[Brown, Jon Brow]

There is some hope that I can cope with this and it depends if the BBC are allowed to show full race re-runs and are able to choose which races they show live.

If the BBC are clever then they will show re-runs of the early morning races. This way many of us can watch them after we have cured our Sunday morning hangovers.

11/03 BHR Bahrain
18/03 AUS Australia ------- Re-run at midday
01/04 MYS Malaysia-------- Re-run at midday
08/04 CHN China------------ Re -run at midday
22/04 KOR Korea------------ Re-run at midday
20/05 ESP Spain
27/05 MCO Monaco ---------- Live on BBC
10/06 CAN Canada------------ Live on BBC
17/06 USA United States-------Live on BBC
01/07 ESP Valencia, Spain
15/07 GBR Great Britain ------- Live on BBC
29/07 DEU Germany ------------ Live on BBC
05/08 HUN Hungary
02/09 BEL Belgium-------------- Live on BBC
09/09 ITA Italy -----------------Live on BBC
30/09 SGP Singapore
14/10 JPN Japan ---------------Re-run at midday
28/10 IND India ----------------Re-run at midday
11/11 ARE Abu Dhabi
25/11 BRA Brazil --------------Live on BBC

I've highlighted 8 races that the BBC must show live and marked the early morning races that are best suited to a re-run.

I'm not too bothered about Bahrain, Spain, Valencia, Hungary, Singapore and Abu Dhabi. Two of them can be live, but highlights are usually enough for those races.

[wedge]

I'm fortunate enough to have Sky Sports so will be able to watch all F1 races live, but if I did not I suspect my interest in watching the highlights after the event would suffer as much as my enjoyment of NASCAR has.

Sky had NASCAR live last year, but dropped that for hour long highlights on the Monday evenings after the race. Almost inevitably during the course of Monday I will, accidentally, see the result simply because I keep up with motorsport news generally.

Once you know the result the sense of anticipation and excitement of what's going to happen, who will be challenging and who will win, will be lost and half the time I don't get around to watching the highlights because of that. Not only that, but by watching the live event you pick up on snippets of news and information that add to your interest so that interest in what's going on around the sport can fade.

When, in the 1970's & 80's, all we had was half-hour highlights of the F1 races it didn't matter so much because that was the only option available to us!

The Hungarian GP was a wonderful example of a race whereby highlights wouldn't do the race justice because of the complexity of race strategy.

Highlights of the 1993 European GP is up on the Beeb's website and I remember watching that for the first time in ages it felt unsatisfactory.

[Mark]

Yes, this is the point, you might think there is nothing happening in a race but there is the tension building of can the driver build up enough gap for a pit stop, how are they managing the tyres etc

[52Paddy]

I'm sure we've all had the scenario where we've missed the live showing of a really great race and had to make do with the highlights. It's never the same - no matter how good the action was. It just doesn't cut it. Fingers crossed it's full race re-runs we will be getting.

[ifacompare]

Its a sad day fir F1

[JDPower]

100,000 signatures and it gets debated in parliament, may be as much use as a chocolate teapot but worth a try I suppose: Keep Formula 1 Free To Air in the UK - e-petitions

[Dave B]

The cabinet office have already indicated that the F1 decision is not up for debate.

[Daniel]

The cabinet office have already indicated that the F1 decision is not up for debate.

I think this is right, whilst I don't like the fact that F1 is going to Sky, it's NOT something which should be debated in parliament, though I do feel that perhaps feel that there should be a review of how the BBC chooses what to show and how much to bid or spend on a program. IMHO the BBC should focus on content which can be sold on elsewhere in the world. The quality of British TV in the 80's and 90's was legendary and back in Australia I would say that most tv which wasn't Australian made was British back in the 80's and this tailed off in the 90's somewhat.

[AndyL]

I think this is right, whilst I don't like the fact that F1 is going to Sky, it's NOT something which should be debated in parliament, though I do feel that perhaps feel that there should be a review of how the BBC chooses what to show and how much to bid or spend on a program.

I think there is a case for debating whether the political decision to spend £900 million on relocating BBC staff and facilities to Salford was to the benefit or detriment of the licence fee payer.

[Daniel]

I think there is a case for debating whether the political decision to spend £900 million on relocating BBC staff and facilities to Salford was to the benefit or detriment of the licence fee payer.

Certainly.