Eurosport commentary

[HelloDolly]

Robbie McEwen, Carlton Kirby and Adam Blythe ...so annoying for different reasons but mostly very poor analysis and insight ...

Got to cancel my GCN subscription

How does one get the international broadcasts ?
why coukd GCN not get some Comms that know GC riding ...why all the sprinters ?

Did they get McEwen to get the Aussies to subscribe ....

 

[TMJ]

I must be the only regular Eurosport cycling viewer that's thankfully not irritated by the commentary team at all.
Come on people, it's cycling, which must be one of the toughest commentary gigs out there.
What do you expect? Let's have some realistic expectations here.
It's uncomfortable to be overly critical of those who have passed away, but be happy the current team of commentators are nothing like late David Duffield.
Unfortunately he made the broadcasts virtually unlistenable, with one exception, when he turned on his critics live on air, hitting back at those "slagging me off."
Not something you hear from commentators very often and it gives you an idea, if you never heard him, how divisive he was.

 

[Netserk]

I've surprised myself by preferring Kirby to Hatch this week. He does talk crap sometimes and lacks racing knowledge but his enthusiasm shines through. I just wish he'd stop naming half the peloton as having a chance of a win.

As for the YouTubers, I prefer the crazy world of Chris Horner to the Lanterne Nerds.

Kirby raises his voice and talks too much, so when getting near the finish in Tirreno I switch to Italian commentary. And I don't have a clue what they say, but they are at least pleasant to listen to.

A shame, as I quite like McEwen.

 

[Potomac]

I like McEwen, seems like he would be an addition to any pub.

 

[Carrick-On-Seine]

Kirby raises his voice and talks too much, so when getting near the finish in Tirreno I switch to Italian commentary. And I don't have a clue what they say, but they are at least pleasant to listen to.

A shame, as I quite like McEwen.

Ah, I just had to watch this again. Hilarious stuff.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ru3vGR8nck

 

[the delgados]

@ Carrick--On--Seine:
That never gets old. My man Carlton Kirby at his finest.

 

[tobydawq]

Ah, I just had to watch this again. Hilarious stuff.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ru3vGR8nck

You even have a McEwen crash in that video at 7:30.

 

[Carrick-On-Seine]

You even have a McEwen crash in that video at 7:30.

Yeah, at the same point as Kirby thinks the peloton passes Keisse before Smith quickly corrects him. Such a classic video.

 

[argyllflyer]

duplicate post

 

[argyllflyer]

Does Declan Quigley no longer work with Eurosport. I know he does alot of the International Comms for races including many organised by RCS, but it would seem like many of the standard ones he'd do have been taken by Jose Been and Jez Cox.

They're all freelancers and would guess DQ's commitments elsewhere restrict his availability to do work for Eurosport/GCN.

 

[argyllflyer]

Jose Been in Friday's race observing a pair of "fishing trawlers" off the Belgian coast before professing to know little of fishing. And a 'nor me' from Maggy.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Carlton would have made up a history of the Belgian fishing industry (largely devoid of fact) and laden it with puns.

Finishing with "Meanwhile, these guys are not floundering..." as someone moves off the front of the group.

 

[Carrick-On-Seine]

Carlton would have made up a history of the Belgian fishing industry (largely devoid of fact) and laden it with puns.

Finishing with "Meanwhile, these guys are not floundering..." as someone moves off the front of the group.

So true. I'm enjoying him this season. May he long keep doing this and never bother to find out about watts per kg, CDA etc. That's for the other guy to explain.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Robbie McEwen, Carlton Kirby and Adam Blythe ...so annoying for different reasons but mostly very poor analysis and insight ...

Got to cancel my GCN subscription

How does one get the international broadcasts ?
why coukd GCN not get some Comms that know GC riding ...why all the sprinters ?

Did they get McEwen to get the Aussies to subscribe ....

For the most part, they are looking at Anglophone commentators and pundits, and until very recently the vast majority of UK or Aussie riders at the top level came via the track and would be sprinters or time trialists. As a result, the majority of the viable pundits they can get would be that type of rider as the majority of the riders that would have knowledge of the GC and have English as their first language are either still active (Yates bros, Porte, Froome etc.) or are tainted by allegations or other doping related issues (Rogers, Horner, Leipheimer, Danielson, Hesjedal), leaving only a couple like Philippa York and Bradley Wiggins that they could use for that purpose and I don't doubt they come at a price.

GCN En Español at least has Óscar Pujol who, although not a GC man in his own right until he left the World Tour and went to race in the Asia Tour, was always a climber and was a mountain domestique for people like Carlos Sastre, Xavier Tondó and Jürgen van den Broeck, although climbers and GC men have always had far more prominence relative to rodadores and sprinters in Spain than anywhere else among traditional cycling nations except possibly Colombia.

 

[manafana]

How is it irritating pronouncing when he's doing the pronounciaction generally correct and how it's supposed to be in the language?

this having a go at someone for saying names correctly is the most angry dad comment going

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

It's not only the commentators that are annoyingly incompetent: Volta a Catalunya pictures with women's Brugge-De Panne commentary.

Corrected after 20 minutes

 

[Carrick-On-Seine]

It's not only the commentators that are annoyingly incompetent: Volta a Catalunya pictures with women's Brugge-De Panne commentary.

Is that on Eurosport Player? I'm having the same issue on GCN.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

GCN, but same company are they not?

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

How can it be that neither Kirby nor Smith know how GC is determined when two riders are on the same time? Both believe that Almeida will be in the lead because he won today.

 

[tobydawq]

How can it be that neither Kirby nor Smith know how GC is determined when two riders are on the same time? Both believe that Almaida will be in the lead because he won today.

It's incredibly stupid.

At least the Danish commentators know how things are.

Speaking of that, why is it that the hundreths of seconds from TT are always kept secret from the viewers? Sometimes you can see it when the rider finishes a TT on the on-screen graphic but afterwards it's not publicised. That is also incredibly stupid. It would also help if organisers of races without TTs just had a graphic with the total of stage placings but at least you can manually calculate that.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

It's incredibly stupid.

At least the Danish commentators know how things are.

Speaking of that, why is it that the hundreths of seconds from TT are always kept secret from the viewers? Sometimes you can see it when the rider finishes a TT on the on-screen graphic but afterwards it's not publicised. That is also incredibly stupid. It would also help if organisers of races without TTs just had a graphic with the total of stage placings but at least you can manually calculate that.

Yet not retained as a secret: PCS (usually, at least) has them in TT results. Stupid indeed that they are in the public forum yet made difficult to find. Well done PCS for breaking the conspiracy of silence. I guess teams are at least aware of them.
But yeah, we need a convention whereby the top of the GC would read
Quintana 17:04'53" (47pts)
Almeida @ 0'00" (114 pts)

If they did that, maybe even Kirby would catch on.

 

[tobydawq]

Yet not retained as a secret: PCS (usually, at least) has them in TT results. Stupid indeed that they are in the public forum yet made difficult to find. Well done PCS for breaking the conspiracy of silence. I guess teams are at least aware of them.
But yeah, we need a convention whereby the top of the GC would read
Quintana 17:04'53" (47pts)
Almeida @ 0'00" (114 pts)

If they did that, maybe even Kirby would catch on.

Oh, I wasn't aware of that, that's great. But you still have to dive into the time split table to find it, but at least it's possible.

 

[lemon cheese cake]

GCN, but same company are they not?

Both Eurosport and Playsportsnetwork (the collective that is GCN, GMBN, GTN, etc) are both owned by Discovery. I don't believe Playsportsnetwork and the Belgian tv network of Playsports thats owned by Telenet are in any way related.

 

[Potomac]

Today's race just confirmed McEwan's quality for me.

 

[argyllflyer]

I like listening to Robbie and always have done. Jez Cox however grinded my gears while catching up on this week's latest semi classic from Belgium, saying that Bruges-De Panne was the 'unofficial sprinter's world championship' at least a dozen times. Did something happen over covid times that elevated the remnant of a good fun '4 stages in 3 days' chipper into something of that ilk? I have never heard it referred to that way.