Olympic TV Coverage

[FormerFF]

I've been ignoring the Olympics for the last decade or so, but since my wife has been watching them some this time, I've tuned in as well. After a half hour or so, I have to say that the U. S coverage is horrible. I was watching some of the snowboarder cross, which is an event I like. NBC showed a couple of the semifinal heats, then went to about four minutes of commercials. They came back for one more heat, then more commercials, then some segment that featured an ex-NFL player but didn't have anything to do with the Games at all. Then more commercials, then they switched to figure skating. I finally gave up and came down to the computer.

Does the rest of the world get such sorry Olympic coverage?

[Storm]

I have zero interest in the summer Olympics thesedays (never had any in the Winter variety) and I guess lots of people here do not care (or even know) one bit about winter sports, and yet, ESPN insists on showing Vancouver live coverage while dropping live Primera Liga coverage from this season.

:angryfire

[Mark]

I've been ignoring the Olympics for the last decade or so, but since my wife has been watching them some this time, I've tuned in as well. After a half hour or so, I have to say that the U. S coverage is horrible. I was watching some of the snowboarder cross, which is an event I like. NBC showed a couple of the semifinal heats, then went to about four minutes of commercials. They came back for one more heat, then more commercials, then some segment that featured an ex-NFL player but didn't have anything to do with the Games at all. Then more commercials, then they switched to figure skating. I finally gave up and came down to the computer.

Does the rest of the world get such sorry Olympic coverage?

People whinge about paying the licence fee, but the BBC is brilliant when it comes to this sort of thing :D

[janneppi]

I think we get pretty adequate coverage. No commercials and two channels showing events, altough today the main channel has put some English and Italian footy players in the middle of the games. ;) They show events where Finns compete, and rest according to how interesting they are.

[Daniel]

I have zero interest in the summer Olympics thesedays (never had any in the Winter variety) and I guess lots of people here do not care (or even know) one bit about winter sports, and yet, ESPN insists on showing Vancouver live coverage while dropping live Primera Liga coverage from this season.

:angryfire
Who wants to watch football? Just some highly paid sissies kicking around a ball and complaining when someone's foot gets within 500 metres of their leg.

[Mark]

The best thing the BBC did was to get rid of Grandstand. It invariably meant that the sport you wanted to watch got interrupted by some other sport nobody was interested in.

I remember qualifying for the German GP in 1996, where they spent the first 30 minutes of the session reading out football scores and cricket results! Not even live coverage! ffs. At least they seem to have learned their lesson.

[AndyRAC]

The best thing the BBC did was to get rid of Grandstand. It invariably meant that the sport you wanted to watch got interrupted by some other sport nobody was interested in.

I remember qualifying for the German GP in 1996, where they spent the first 30 minutes of the session reading out football scores and cricket results! Not even live coverage! ffs. At least they seem to have learned their lesson.

I'm actually going to disagree with you. The loss of Grandstand, Sportsnight, Sport on Friday have meant a loss of 'lesser sports' on 'normal' TV, including Rallying, cyclocross, etc, even horse racing has been marginalsed. Now, all we get are a handful of sports which get huuge coverage. I do understand the frustration with not giving the qualifying proper coverage, and I do remember the old Sunday Grandstand when they went to the grid fairly late.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Well, here there is a lot of issues with the homeside coverage. CBC used to cover the Olympics and somehow show us what we wanted to see between the main network, their "Newsworld" channel and their affiliate's. Now the private broadcaster CTV owns the rights for this Olympics and London at least. They have cobbled together a private consortium with TSN, TSN2, and the Roger's Sportsnet family along with their main network. So once you get the hang of it, you can pick your choice of sports. Tonight, we have Hockey on the TSN/TSN2, Snowboardcross for the ladies on Sportsnet and the men's short on CTV. It almost has to be done with 3 or 4 channels to cover the Olympics and somehow CTV is managing to make it work, but the public broadcaster CBC had it down pretty good and we were comfortable with it.

NBC annoys me for the most part, but I flip over there every now and then to see how they portray something that happens if a Canadian wins or for the opening ceremonies to see how the American view of things was.

The thing is tho, when CBC covered the Olympics, being an over the air broadcaster, they would get enormous amounts of Americans watching because NBC/CBS/ABC would only of course sanitize and tape everything showing mainly just the Americans. Us Canadians, not doing so well in a lot of sports over the years have always watched as many events as possible live and watch everyone. Lately, we have gotten into the flagrant flag waving bit ourselves, but the CTV consortium isn't really over the air except for the main channel so the Americans likely unable to watch anyhow.

I love the 2 weeks of the Olympics and find myself a media junkie during all of it. If we had the BBC or Australian coverage on our TV's, I would likely wallow in some of that too...lol

[dunes]

All the broardcasting channels should take lessons from the old CBC. Even in Detroit I'd watch the canadian coverage over the US. There was just no comparing it.Besides who knows hockey better than those little skinny fellows. The game announcer and Don McClain.I still catch them on saturday nights, Only wish they'd be represented better by copiing the way they did things.

[Mark in Oshawa]

All the broardcasting channels should take lessons from the old CBC. Even in Detroit I'd watch the canadian coverage over the US. There was just no comparing it.Besides who knows hockey better than those little skinny fellows. The game announcer and Don McClain.I still catch them on saturday nights, Only wish they'd be represented better by copiing the way they did things.

Ron McLean is the Hockey Night in Canada host you remember. Ron, and his favourite pitbull at the first intermission, Don Cherry, former coach of the Bruins in the 70's, and possibly the wildest dresser on North American TV.

You are like many who loved the CBC coverage in the states. Because we don't have a gold medal candidate in every sport (hard to be when you are but 34 million people in a big empty country), our networks tend to cover all sports and all the national heroes. Johan Olav Koss is a big deal in Canada for what he did in Lillehammar, but I suspect most Americans have NO idea who he is. Ditto for Bjorn Daehlie, Alberto Tomba and Rhona Martin but most Canadians who follow the Olympics know these guys/women...

[FormerFF]

OK, NBC showed us three of the four quarterfinals in the womens snowboardcross, and the two semifinals. Since the American fell, they didn't show the finals, and instead switched to (ugh) figure skating. I'm sorry, anything that requires a hair stylist, a makeup artist, and a costumer is not a sport.

[Mark in Oshawa]

OK, NBC showed us three of the four quarterfinals in the womens snowboardcross, and the two semifinals. Since the American fell, they didn't show the finals, and instead switched to (ugh) figure skating. I'm sorry, anything that requires a hair stylist, a makeup artist, and a costumer is not a sport.

They didn't show the Canadian girl winning the gold? Now that is just sad....because if the situation was reversed and Jacobellis had won while the Canadian girl Ricker had flamed out, we would get the final. No matter what, Canadian TV gets the story.

Try going to CTV's Olympic page and see if you can watch. I tried to watch NBC's coverage of the Canada-Norway game to see how NBC was covering the game and with whom, but I was blocked. Maybe CTV will allow full coverage for you or you can find the events you want archived.

[Storm]

I "tried" watching the Vancouver thingie last night for a couple of minutes and not sure if it was curling or something (?) some guys sweeping in front of a ball type thing...and it was Norway v Canada. Funniest thing I have seen in ages - the norwegian guys wearing something like what the Croatian team's socks as pants :laugh:

[Mark in Oshawa]

I "tried" watching the Vancouver thingie last night for a couple of minutes and not sure if it was curling or something (?) some guys sweeping in front of a ball type thing...and it was Norway v Canada. Funniest thing I have seen in ages - the norwegian guys wearing something like what the Croatian team's socks as pants :laugh:

THAT was Curling, and out of all the sports in the Winter Olympics, THAT one would be probably the hardest to explain to someone from India!!!

First off, the Norwegians were just showing a little flair, and in Curling, having a sense of humour is just part of the more congenial nature of the sport.

Curling, for those not understanding is originally a Scottish game. Those were not a ball things...they are 43 lbs of Granite (from one quarry on Ailsa Craig Scotland) rocks. Those rocks are perfectly balanced and turned on a lathe. The reason the guys sweep is to either deter the rock from curling (the spin of the rock will cause it to follow a curved path or "curl :) or to make it go further into the rings. It is how the "skip" adjusts the rock's path after it has been thrown.

If you watched long enough, it is pretty easy to grasp what the point of it is...and contrary to popular belief, it isn't easy to master...and there is a lot of strategy....

[Daniel]

THAT was Curling, and out of all the sports in the Winter Olympics, THAT one would be probably the hardest to explain to someone from India!!!

First off, the Norwegians were just showing a little flair, and in Curling, having a sense of humour is just part of the more congenial nature of the sport.

Curling, for those not understanding is originally a Scottish game. Those were not a ball things...they are 43 lbs of Granite (from one quarry on Ailsa Craig Scotland) rocks. Those rocks are perfectly balanced and turned on a lathe. The reason the guys sweep is to either deter the rock from curling (the spin of the rock will cause it to follow a curved path or "curl :) or to make it go further into the rings. It is how the "skip" adjusts the rock's path after it has been thrown.

If you watched long enough, it is pretty easy to grasp what the point of it is...and contrary to popular belief, it isn't easy to master...and there is a lot of strategy....
I can barely skate on ice let alone skate whilst doing the sweeping and attemping to use my brain to think about strategies etc etc :mark:

[Mark in Oshawa]

I can barely skate on ice let alone skate whilst doing the sweeping and attemping to use my brain to think about strategies etc etc :mark:

Another misconception Daniel. The ice, while still slippery actually has more grip than you realize. The reason the curlers can slide is that they have teflon patches on their shoes but only ONE shoe.... The other has a soft rubber sole for pushing. You learn to curl, you realize that the ice isn't THAT slippery for the rubber since the surface has a pebbled texture. The rocks will slide easily, but that rubber grip soul will hold on quite easily.

You are NOT skating on that ice believe me....

[Daniel]

Another misconception Daniel. The ice, while still slippery actually has more grip than you realize. The reason the curlers can slide is that they have teflon patches on their shoes but only ONE shoe.... The other has a soft rubber sole for pushing. You learn to curl, you realize that the ice isn't THAT slippery for the rubber since the surface has a pebbled texture. The rocks will slide easily, but that rubber grip soul will hold on quite easily.

You are NOT skating on that ice believe me....
Didn't realise they weren't skating :mark: Anyway I'd still be falling over.....

[Mark in Oshawa]

Didn't realise they weren't skating :mark: Anyway I'd still be falling over.....

Nope...I doubt it. You might fall maybe once if you got careless, but it is a knack for not taking large steps and you quickly figure it out. If you ever came to my part of the world, I would take you to a curling rink. Don't know of anyone who has tried it once who didn't have a blast doing it.....

[Daniel]

Nope...I doubt it. You might fall maybe once if you got careless, but it is a knack for not taking large steps and you quickly figure it out. If you ever came to my part of the world, I would take you to a curling rink. Don't know of anyone who has tried it once who didn't have a blast doing it.....
The last time I went skating (yes I know it's not skating :p ) I fell over and either broke my cocyx or bruised it very badly. Boy did it hurt for weeks and weeks. I'm actually alright walking on ice though when my parents were here I did slip over pretty badly and was a few cm from knocking my head on a very solid steel gate.

[veeten]

speaking of which, it's on right now. :)

[Mark in Oshawa]

The last time I went skating (yes I know it's not skating :p ) I fell over and either broke my cocyx or bruised it very badly. Boy did it hurt for weeks and weeks. I'm actually alright walking on ice though when my parents were here I did slip over pretty badly and was a few cm from knocking my head on a very solid steel gate.

Well, skating is a different deal...and since I played hockey for a few years, I got past that fall down and go boom stage...but being on a curling rink is walking.....not falling.

[Mark in Oshawa]

speaking of which, it's on right now. :)

I will have it on today as I do my chores around here....

[Alfa Fan]

People whinge about paying the licence fee, but the BBC is brilliant when it comes to this sort of thing :D

Yep the coverage is absolutely comprehensive. Usually multiple live events to choose from (I believe as many as 4 simultaneously on Sky but the 2 on freeview are adequate!), as well as a mix of live coverage and highlights throughout the night on BBC2. You'd struggle to get more from a dedicated Sports broadcaster.

[edv]

NBC showed a couple of the semifinal heats, then went to about four minutes of commercials. They came back for one more heat, then more commercials, then some segment that featured an ex-NFL player but didn't have anything to do with the Games at all. Then more commercials, then they switched to figure skating.

This is where DVRs/PVRs come in handy.

My wife & I each have our own dual tuner HD PVR and watch 2 feeds. With the Pause feature, you can avoid the commercials and the other fluff. I love it! Basically I haven't watched a commercial in years.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Yep the coverage is absolutely comprehensive. Usually multiple live events to choose from (I believe as many as 4 simultaneously on Sky but the 2 on freeview are adequate!), as well as a mix of live coverage and highlights throughout the night on BBC2. You'd struggle to get more from a dedicated Sports broadcaster.

Our two dedicated sports broadcasters are working with the largest private network to do a pretty decent job. That said, the CBC had it down for years....

[dunes]

They didn't show the Canadian girl winning the gold? Now that is just sad....because if the situation was reversed and Jacobellis had won.
Did any one see her interview after see was DQed.She is an imbarresment to herself. Even more so than opening night when she said she was better and more qualfied than her teammates.The NBC broadcasters are even more to blame for airing her non chalaunt attitude twoard her sport.

[Easy Drifter]

Looks like I won't be watching any more for a while.
My 8 mo. old Sony is showing mostly snow. Tried all connections inside but zip. Figured it likely was satellite dish. Just to check tried to play a recorded program. Snow so not dish.
Will be calling dealer tomorrow after I check warranty.
My old Hitachi lasted over 25 years!

[Dave B]

The BBC coverage has been excellent. Live coverage overnight including the HD channel, and good highlights packages through the day. As Mark says, people moan about the licence fee but it's the cost of a daily newspaper and worth every penny most of the time.

Regarding ice skating, how depressing must it be for Robin Cousins to have to go back to judging ITV1's Dancing On Ice after being in Vancouver to watch the world's best? A bunch of soap actors and z-listers making a meal of even the simplest moves at a speed which wouldn't trouble an arthritic sloth, with Philip Schofield shouting premium rate phone numbers every few minutes.

[Mark in Oshawa]

The BBC coverage has been excellent. Live coverage overnight including the HD channel, and good highlights packages through the day. As Mark says, people moan about the licence fee but it's the cost of a daily newspaper and worth every penny most of the time.

Regarding ice skating, how depressing must it be for Robin Cousins to have to go back to judging ITV1's Dancing On Ice after being in Vancouver to watch the world's best? A bunch of soap actors and z-listers making a meal of even the simplest moves at a speed which wouldn't trouble an arthritic sloth, with Philip Schofield shouting premium rate phone numbers every few minutes.

We did the Dancing on Ice sort of thing here...but they put the figure skating girls with retired hockey players....and then we saw a)how hard that pairs/dance stuff can be and b) how freaking big hockey players are compared to figure skating men.....

Battle of the Blades was a big deal up here, and contrary to popular belief, hockey players proved once again they were not all just missing teeth and class. People who don't even LIKE Figure skating tuned in.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Looks like I won't be watching any more for a while.
My 8 mo. old Sony is showing mostly snow. Tried all connections inside but zip. Figured it likely was satellite dish. Just to check tried to play a recorded program. Snow so not dish.
Will be calling dealer tomorrow after I check warranty.
My old Hitachi lasted over 25 years!

8 month old SONY? That has to be a warranty thing.....

That said, if you have high speed internet, you can watch anything CTV/TSN has for the games over the computer. I had the Canada-Norway game on the computer when the "boss" was watching her men's short program in figure skating....

[Easy Drifter]

Dial up

[Mark in Oshawa]

Dial up

you need one of those Roger's or Bell' cellular/satellite access sticks.....

[Easy Drifter]

Ma Bell hasn't figured out I am not paying for the service for 10 years.

[Mark in Oshawa]

Ma Bell hasn't figured out I am not paying for the service for 10 years.

Ya..but it is biting you right now....high speed is the way to go Drifter...

[SportscarBruce]

I'm totally enjoying NBC's coverage of the Winter Games, they've managed to capture the event without glaringly artificial hype and eyeball-searing graphics leaping off the screen at the viewer (as is common nowadays by *ahEM* certain broadcast sports entities. Also the games themselves have retained the Olympic magic and aura, unlike the Summer Games which have descended into a crass spectacle of bad behavior, commercial exploitation, and seemingly unending controversies.