Long Beach GP, UK Coverage?

[DazzlaF1]

Sorry if this is already been mentioned.

I know SKY are showing the Motegi race on the Saturday over here, but not Long Beach, is it being shown over here at all?

[trapperjohn]

Doesn't look like it. There will be a life stream on Indycar.com on sunday though. Hardly makes up for it relly.

[BobGarage]

as per... http://www.motorsportforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126266

its not being shown in the UK. w@nkers that sky are

[Andrewmcm]

I wouldn't pin the blame on Sky for no Long Beach - they would have put in a bid to show X number of Indycar races long before CC got swallowed up by Indycar. I doubt that the rights to show Long Beach would be free so there might not be any financial lee-way to add it to the schedule. Who knows?

It's a no-win situation for TV, as who are the TV companies going to negotiate with to secure a contract to show the LB race? Does CC even have a department that deals with that any more? European TV rights are probably not even a blip on the radar for CCWS as it enters its final throes.

[BobGarage]

I wouldn't pin the blame on Sky for no Long Beach - they would have put in a bid to show X number of Indycar races long before CC got swallowed up by Indycar. I doubt that the rights to show Long Beach would be free so there might not be any financial lee-way to add it to the schedule. Who knows?

It's a no-win situation for TV, as who are the TV companies going to negotiate with to secure a contract to show the LB race? Does CC even have a department that deals with that any more? European TV rights are probably not even a blip on the radar for CCWS as it enters its final throes.

according to Europsport the race isn't a champ car race and so they are not allowed to show it. They say it comes under the IRL contract.

Sky have a 3 season deal with the IRL to show all their races. The IRL don't know how many races they are going to have next year or the year after so I doubt the deal is for a set number of races, and more likely to just be an "all races" deal.

If that is not the case does that mean sky will also not show edmonton and surfers?

Skys production of motorsports is poor. Their coverage of NASCAR is ***** It is improving slowly after the barrage of emails to them at the address they advertise during their nascar shows. They don't give any email addresses during IndyCar shows, so how are we supposed to give them feedback? I've been emailing their NASCAR address but never had a response.

they don't seem to care about their motorsports coverage (both NASCAR and the IRL got less than 30,000 viewers on the St. Pete weekend so I don't blame them for not caring in that respect). They seem to use both as just a filler for a sunday evening/night when they have got nothing else to show.

[Bobby_Hamlin]

Skys production of motorsports is poor. Their coverage of NASCAR is ***** It is improving slowly after the barrage of emails to them at the address they advertise during their nascar shows. They don't give any email addresses during IndyCar shows, so how are we supposed to give them feedback? I've been emailing their NASCAR address but never had a response.

they don't seem to care about their motorsports coverage (both NASCAR and the IRL got less than 30,000 viewers on the St. Pete weekend so I don't blame them for not caring in that respect). They seem to use both as just a filler for a sunday evening/night when they have got nothing else to show.

Of course they'll show those races since they'll involve the IRL teams and drivers, you know, the series they signed up to show, ie. not the last hurrah of a club series.

As somebody who has watched motorsport on Sky for many years now I can only say from my experience you are entirely wrong. In that time I've followed NASCAR, IRL and in 2002 CART and this idea of it being a 'filler' is ridiculous.

They seem to have bent over backwards so far to accommodate the latest NASCAR coverage even showing the rain delayed California race live on the Monday. In 2002 they stepped in when CART wasn't showing on any television channel in the UK and provided live coverage wherever possible, despite already having a deal in place with the IRL.

Now admittedly they insist on providing studio 'coverage' for all their programming which I can imagine does grate on the more die hard fans but they've certainly been responding to feedback as much as they can from what I can see. In terms of NASCAR coverage I just recall the amount of times some baseball or hockey game on NASN/Setanta superseded their NASCAR showing, or how about the times when it was pushed onto Setanta Ireland and after slightly overrunning the next programme was Ireland-only thus blocking the picture on the stroke of midnight.

I was watching CART on Eurosport back in the days when you'd be lucky to see a race on time with their pathetic scheduling issues e.g. overrunning youth football or some nonsense. In 1999 when the Rio race was slightly rain-delayed they didn't even bother sticking with it for the less than half an hour it would have taken, they ditched it leaving me to watch the race on the basic Omega online timing they had back then.

So you know I'll gladly take Sky's coverage right now, studio and all.

[mikiec]

Premiere beats both Sky and Eurosport. Think they've lost NASCAR this year, but hey, that's no biggie! ;)

No advert breaks, no studio chat, just the uninterrupted International coverage. My only gripe is that they're pretty keen to cut it short straight after the race, but then so were Eurosport.

Same goes for their coverage of A1GP and F1. Their F1 has no English audio but they do have an audio channel with no commentators and additional video channels with onboard cams, etc. All comes in handy when ITV goes to a break.

Doesn't look like they're showing Long Beach though. :(

[philipbain]

Lets be honest, ANYTHING is better than Eurosport's coverage! To be very honest I thought Motors TV's coverage of Champ Car in 2004 was infinitely better than Eurosport's previous (before 2001 & 2003) and consequent coverage (from 2005 - 2007). Motors TV gave the series deserved top billing, showed the races live, in wide screen, with the full US commentary and pitlane coverage and with less interruption. Commercial interruption I can understand, Eurosport is a commercial station, but more often than not the breaks on Eurosport contained no commercials, just ads for other Eurosport programs (who the hell watches hand ball????), their crappy website and crappy text service.

I like Sky's coverage, it isn't perfect for sure but the studio presenter and the analysts are knowledgeable and enthusiastic. It would be nice if they were at the track at least for the Indy 500, but it's very much a niche in Sky's programming (which lets face it is all about the football!) and its good to see that they are taking on board feedback from viewers and the coverage is forever improving. The addition of NASCAR this season proves Sky's commitment to US racing too and although NASCAR races tend to go on for far too long they are at least covered in full.

Will any European station show the race either live or recorded or highlights???
I've failed to find one.