What is cycling TV coverage like where you live?

[53 x 11]

aaaarrrrrrggggggghhhhhh

 

[kelvedon wonder]

In the UK not a lot unless you have satellite. ITV4 does the Tour de France, Tour of Britain and Tour of Ireland, and the BBC showed the world track championships (only because it was something where GB was likely to win medals).

I'm scared to get satellite TV because I know that I would end up parked on the sofa every night watching obscure football matches in between the cycling stuff.

 

[ak-zaaf]

aaaarrrrrrggggggghhhhhh

This is also on of the best and safest countries in the world to ride a bike yourself

/edit: No Basque Country coverage. TEH HORROR!

 

[GoGarmin]

I'm no fan of Versus' coverage ... the Lance channel ... but it's hard to argue with cycling in high definition. That beats the hell out of online streaming.

 

[Ferminal]

How is the image quality of pictures elsewhere?

So far on Eurosport a lot of the races have been pretty bad quality. In Paris-Nice it was very difficult to make out riders with all the big blotches. These days I watch all my sport in full HD, but there is no Eurosport HD here.

Is what I describe the same for Eurosport (SD) everywhere, is the HD much better? What about Channel Lance? I'm just wondering whether Eurosport are beaming **** quality pictures down here, or if it's the same everywhere early in the season.

 

[Beech Mtn]

I never watch Versus anymore. That channel is absolute garbage. I check cyclingfans.com for the feeds.

+1, except that I find feeds from Steephill mostly. I used to rely on Versus a lot more, but don't really need it now. Universal Sports online is also useful (carried Giro and Vuelta last year), although sometimes the commentators are bad.

 

[53 x 11]

This is also on of the best and safest countries in the world to ride a bike yourself

/edit: No Basque Country coverage. TEH HORROR!

Yes, but your hills make Australia’s look like the Alps!

Its such a shame that where I live, in a city of over a million people, I can ride for 15 mins and be on hills up to 10 kms long, in 30 mins I can be riding along beautiful beeches. I've travelled over a fair chunk of the earth and I can honestly say that this is one of, if not the best pace to ride.

HOWEVER, there is F-all cycling culture here, and I doubt there ever will be. Stuck at the arse end of the world geting covered in shit!

 

[3rdWheel]

I can't complain about Versus because as a DirecTV subscriber, we almost were left with no converage. Although I did catch a live internet feed of the Ronde, i think in Flemish, and enjoyed the last 40Km of the race. Then looked at Versus' coverage later in the day to see the parts I missed which wasn't much. The Lance lovefest didn't bother me as much as last year.

 

[El Oso]

Question for those in America: Does Lance if he is racing or not (or when he retired in 2005) have any impact on TV coverage? Roubaix got shown live the year after O'Grady won Roubaix.

YES! Only the Tour is shown live here and the nice thing is Versus shows the stage about 4 times throughout the day (or at least they used to), although the night show is extremely dumbed down for the audience with no knowledge of cycling with Roll and an American with no knowledge whatsoever doing most of the talking instead of Phil and Paul.

Post-2005 I thought the coverage was a bit more balanced since Lance wasn't soaking up the attention. But then again I think the Tour as a whole was more balanced. However, it also seemed that Post-2005 their race coverage as a whole decreased. They dropped the Vuelta and reduced the Giro to a weekend only recap.

Coverage is obviously angophone based. If Lance is racing it is guaranteed there will be a segement on him. As I mentioned above I was ****ed at the timing in De Ronde because they did it right at the start of the Koppenberg.

 

[soOpOSMthanks!]

I get Versus and Universal Sports. I also have rely on torrents.

Versus is just as good as Sporza coverage wise as they use the same feed. But have a tendency to only show the 'major' races and those with Lance in them. But then I have to deal with Lance handjobs/sucking offs, meh.

Universal brings me coverage of a good amount of races too (MSR, Tirreno, Tour of the Basque Country, Giro, etc.)

I use torrents for races I KNOW I cant watch on tv, like E3 Prisj and Dwaars...I have a tendency to doze off though because I don't know Dutch.

 

[Michele]

Italy=you would expect a lot of coverage but usually just the big races or classics/semi-classics are broadcasted on RAI otherwise on RAISport.
Yesterday for example Flanders was on RAISport but they showed it again today around 1pm.
Just the main events are live, while usually the others are recorded (like Settimana Lombarda).

As for Spain, also in Italy cycling comes second to soccer; that sport is almost 24hrs per day on tv (some tv programs are called "Studio Sport" but then talk only about soccer).

 

[Hugh Januss]

What is cycling TV coverage like where you live?

Lance Lance Lance Lance Lance Lance

 

[MacRoadie]

Lance Lance Lance Lance Lance Lance

And that doesn't include the Michelob Lite commercials either...

 

[180mmCrank]

Pretty much no coverage in Canada. TdF on OLN and that's it.

I get my fix all from the Web and like others surf around using cyclingfans site, steephill TV and I have at times subscribed to Cycling TV and had some joy and frustration out of that.

Generally I can find what I want.

I am looking forward to a future of better quality converged media where I can watch this sat on my sofa rather than at the kitchen table on my laptop. I think this is not too far away.

But the actual TV coverage here is pathetic compared to Eurozone. Which is a shame because I think there is some appetite. There was talk about starting a dedicated sport channel for non ProSport (not NHL, NBA, NFL, NXX etc) that would carry Olympic sports like athletics, swimming, cycling etc but that was a couple of years ago and not heard anything recently. When i was in the UK we had Sky, EuroSport and a bunch of terrestial channels that all carried a range of sport - it was fantastic! I miss it. Some folk out here subscribe to UK TV rather than Canadian cable because they prefer the coverage in general.

 

[luckyboy]

Eurosport UK

Just watch feeds for smaller races.

 

[coppiman]

How is the image quality of pictures elsewhere?

So far on Eurosport a lot of the races have been pretty bad quality. In Paris-Nice it was very difficult to make out riders with all the big blotches. These days I watch all my sport in full HD, but there is no Eurosport HD here.

Is what I describe the same for Eurosport (SD) everywhere, is the HD much better? What about Channel Lance? I'm just wondering whether Eurosport are beaming **** quality pictures down here, or if it's the same everywhere early in the season.

I have cable with Virgin Media which released Eurosport HD on 1st April. I watched yesterday's Ronde in HD and it was superb. The picture is far better, especially the shots from the mopeds that usually cause the pixels to break. Crystal clear. The cycling coverage on British Eurosport has been excellent. We had the last 4 hours yesterday live. Very good.

 

[ingsve]

In Sweden it's Eurosport international (with swedish commentators) that's the only real option. Not as many races as British Eurosport but all the big races at least. Also swedish national television aired Worlds last year probably because of the success of Emma Johansson and Gustav Larsson in the olympics.

 

[Boeing]

I get VS and Universal. Lots of cycling Universal. GOGO is great btw

We get some cycling on VS between all the adds for their own.

 

[Big_Blue_Dave]

I have cable with Virgin Media which released Eurosport HD on 1st April. I watched yesterday's Ronde in HD and it was superb. The picture is far better, especially the shots from the mopeds that usually cause the pixels to break. Crystal clear. The cycling coverage on British Eurosport has been excellent. We had the last 4 hours yesterday live. Very good.

What??? Looks like that has not yet been rolled out here you jammy git. Think I need to call Virgin Media as soon as possible.

 

[bylbyl]

To make you all a bit jealous:
i'm from belgium, so i have almost every major race live on tv, from the moment the network that is covering the race, starts broadcasting

also we have quite a few side-programs and documentaries on cyclists - important races - cycling in general (we even had tour de Burkina Faso here)

so far this year we had:
- almost every cyclocross
- tour down under
- think we had qatar too
- omloop het nieuwsblad
- kuurne-brussel-kuurne
- milano-sanremo
- paris-nice
- tirreno-adriatico
- driedaagse van west-vlaanderen
- dwars door vlaanderen
- Nokere Koerse
- E3 prijs
- gent-wevelgem
- catalunya
- driedaagse de panne
- criterium international
- ronde van vlaanderen
maybe i'm forgetting a few races

upcoming

- pais vasco
- scheldeprijs
- brabantse pijl
- liege-bastogne-liege
- fleche wallone
- grand prix de la wallonie
- amstel gold race
- rund um Henniger turm
- romandia
- giro
- switzerland
- dauphiné libéré
- everything else worth (and not worth) showing

 

[maltiv]

In Norway pretty much every race of importance is sent on TV2. And the races that aren't there are shown on norwegian eurosport instead. It's awesome

 

[ingsve]

In Norway pretty much every race of importance is sent on TV2. And the races that aren't there are shown on norwegian eurosport instead. It's awesome

Ya, except for their damn georestricted internet streams...I need to move to norway. Or perhaps I should just move to belgium and learn dutch or french.

 

[ckfrancis]

Dominican Republic

The coverage is good. We get most races live on Eurosport (in French) and then delayed by about 30 mins on RAI (in Italian). I watched the Sat. stage of the CI with my 3 year old daughter on the deck overlooking the ocean with para gliders passing overhead.

I asked her to pick the winner with about 20km to go and she pointed to a Bbox rider and I chose AC. We bet 10 pesos (about 30 cents or a few lollpops). She won.

She went ahead and chose another Bbox rider in the RVV and I went with Boonen. I guess it was a push. Neither of use won.

Looking forward to Circuit de la Sarthe.

 

[Digger]

Ireland

Have Eurosport through Satellite. All the classics...Worlds...Grand Tours obviously...Paris Nice, Eneco, Qatar and Basque Tour this week.
Commentary is poor imo. Although Kelly is amusing anytime there's a drug story, as he literally doesn't mutter a word, one way or the other. Strange that but in fairness, at least he's not being hypocritical. Also, I reckon Sean gets paid each time he uses the word 'certainly'. But in terms of TV pictures, it's a great channel.

Note: Kirsty Anderson, Phil's wife, was a regular on Eurosport for a few years, and I honest;y think she was one of the most irritating TV commentators I've ever heard. Firstly, she was infatuated with George, Lance and anything American. Not so bad....Then she'd be told over the phone, live on air that such and such a rider was away. She's answer, 'well i thought he'd do something today, because this morning, he had that look in his eye'. Everyday almost without fail, she had this story. I think one day they told her just to mess her up...she gave her usual reply about not being surprised and that he had that look in his eye, and the commentators said, Sorry Kirsty, we got the wrong guy!!!!

 

[issoisso]

What is cycling TV coverage like where I live?

Well, there are two commentators. One is decent. The other is awesome but is rarely ever there.

And then there's Paulo Martins, the whole reason why I prefer internet streams to the TV. When he doesn't know something, he'll never admit it. He'll always lie about it, make something up

Here are some of his gems:

- Paulinho isn't with the main group anymore because he he worked extremely hard for his team leaders before the TV feed began, and got dropped because he was exhausted of course. In fact I just talked to him on the phone this morning and he said that X and Y an Z and (...) [Paulinho wasn't at that race, the 2006 Vattenfall Cyclassics]

- He's riding at a good pace. You can see he's not in a deficit of difficult [someone should tell him what deficit means]

- A very extremely highly pace

- It's a climb that is far too hard for any sport. Or for cycling, in this case

- This man might come close to Di Luca, if Di Luca can't do a time like the one this man just did

- Especially the second stage, which is right after the first one

- Simoni is the most experienced. He's the one with the most "maturism"

- [after some guy attacks] And everyone counters! [camera pans to show everyone slowing down to a crawl waiting for someone to take up the chase]

- [camera shows Moerenhout in his dutch champion jersey] Here's Rabobank's belgian champion

- Thor Hushovd is becoming a specialist in short prologues [as opposed to 50km prologues, maybe?]

- It's not just the 3rd place that's at stake...there's also the fight for the 3rd place on the podium!

- Very huge

- [The graphic on the TV shows the best placed Dutchman in each previous edition of the Amstel. There's an obvious mistake on the graphic, since Rölf "Ego" Sorensen is shown for 1993. He refers to him as] The flying dutchman Ricky Sörensen

- [Brandt attacks. is brought back. Then his teammate Aerts attacks. Brought back. Then their teammate Lloyd attacks. is brought back. Every single time, he says "there goes van summeren again". Then Van Summeren attacks] There he goes again! Unending energy! What a fabulous rider. [I should note all those riders are somewhere around average height. Van Summeren is 1,97m. He's also a long-haired, light-haired rider. All the others have short hair, most of them black)

- There's australian champion Peffaberga [That would be austrian champion Pfannberger]

- [In the same race as the two above, LBL 2008] That's austrian champion Matteo Floyd [no prizes for guessing who he meant. Australian champion Matt Lloyd, of course]


- [Frank Schleck and Karsten Kroon both get in the same move] There's the two schlecks, they're like carbon copies of each other, it's very hard to tell them apart
[I remind you that
A. it's actually F. Schleck and K.Kroon and
B. even if it were the two schlecks, they're not really all that similar. The hair colour being an obvious giveaway;
After about 10 minutes he finally relents and admits it's not the two schlecks. Then tries to say he was right all along because]
It's not the same schleck as before!This one's a little bit different.

- Kirchen won with clarity [I think he meant "won clearly"]

- The first time he won that win

- There's a response by two CSC riders: Cunego and Evans

- Kim Kirchen has been very disappointing today [Kirchen is right there at the front in the winning move]

- Plus the ten trillion mispronounced words (I'm talking words as common as the local word for "water"...which is one of the ones he can't pronounce)

- Plus switching the syllables of EVERY foreign non-spanish name


And my favorite of all time:

Landis is away on his "epic" comeback stage win in 2006. He goes over the Joux-Plane and starts descending to the finish. Sastre's 5 minutes behind. The genius commentator chimes in:

Of course, he's already descending while the others are still going up the climb, so of course he gets to go faster, so of course the time gap is "false", it's much bigger than what the REAL gap is. When the chasers start descending the gap will of course become much smaller. That's when we'll know what the real time is.

The co-commentator starts explaining to him how moronic that is and why exactly the gap is the gap and whether one is descending or ascending has nothing to do with it.

He's having none of it. He continues to insist that he's right.

In the end they never convinced him.