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2018 Formula 1 Season

Timmert
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texasmade texasmade
One more thing to add. ESPN was a joke. For the non-Americans who watched the race and don’t know what I’m talking about. It was a bunch of clowns running the broadcast because it was on late and they couldn’t get a real team to cover the broadcast. Commercial breaks on a race restart, commercial breaks during live interviews, feed cutting back in mid conversation and not explaining what happened during the break.

If Liberty really wants to grow the sport in the US, they can’t have their broadcast partners treat it like a joke.
Crap, I was about to get myself a decent VPN to watch the ESPN stream of Sky!
Is it really that bad?

I've spent the entire weekend looking for ways to get the Sky coverage in the Netherlands, including paying for the UK Now TV subscription. Guess what, it's impossible without a UK credit card. It is utterly ridiculous that companies are still trying to geo-lock these kinds of things. People travel, move to other countries. Stop these 1980's shenanigans, we have the internet now!
So I'm back to watching the free online feeds...

I enjoyed watching the race, by the way. Not a lot of overtakes indeed, but it was great to see a mix of teams battling it out for the points.
 
Foo2rama
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texasmade texasmade
One more thing to add. ESPN was a joke. For the non-Americans who watched the race and don’t know what I’m talking about. It was a bunch of clowns running the broadcast because it was on late and they couldn’t get a real team to cover the broadcast. Commercial breaks on a race restart, commercial breaks during live interviews, feed cutting back in mid conversation and not explaining what happened during the break.

If Liberty really wants to grow the sport in the US, they can’t have their broadcast partners treat it like a joke.
That is a real team the SKY is considered the best. The problem is they f’ed up sound and pre race. Sky runs no commercials and the auto scheduled commercials where unlucky times. The grid walk would have been bad for anyone due to the oddly timed tribute.


The problem besides the technical issue is sky does like 3 hours before and 1 after with great interviews. But missing the pre race we lost a lot of the data they where talking about. Commercials blew, and sky assumes a high knowledge of the sport vs the nbc dumbed down cast.
 
texasmade
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Foo2rama Foo2rama
That is a real team the SKY is considered the best. The problem is they f’ed up sound and pre race. Sky runs no commercials and the auto scheduled commercials where unlucky times. The grid walk would have been bad for anyone due to the oddly timed tribute.


The problem besides the technical issue is sky does like 3 hours before and 1 after with great interviews. But missing the pre race we lost a lot of the data they where talking about. Commercials blew, and sky assumes a high knowledge of the sport vs the nbc dumbed down cast.

I can just imagine ESPN now. They’re broadcasting the formation lap and the cars line up. Lights are about to go out and then ESPN cuts to a commercial of Mother’s Wax. After 3 minutes of commercials ESPN comes back in and there’s a safety car because 4 cars crashed on turn 1 lap 1. After 5 laps behind the SC,the restart is about to happen when ESPN does another commercial break.
 
texasmade
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Timmert Timmert
Crap, I was about to get myself a decent VPN to watch the ESPN stream of Sky!
Is it really that bad?

I've spent the entire weekend looking for ways to get the Sky coverage in the Netherlands, including paying for the UK Now TV subscription. Guess what, it's impossible without a UK credit card. It is utterly ridiculous that companies are still trying to geo-lock these kinds of things. People travel, move to other countries. Stop these 1980's shenanigans, we have the internet now!
So I'm back to watching the free online feeds...

I enjoyed watching the race, by the way. Not a lot of overtakes indeed, but it was great to see a mix of teams battling it out for the points.
http://awfulannouncing.com/espn/espn-apologizes-f1-fans-rough-debut-weekend-coverage.html

That link pretty much sums up everything that went wrong from practice all the way through the race. Post race was also cutoff for an episode of 30 for 30.
 
Foo2rama
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texasmade texasmade
I can just imagine ESPN now. They’re broadcasting the formation lap and the cars line up. Lights are about to go out and then ESPN cuts to a commercial of Mother’s Wax. After 3 minutes of commercials ESPN comes back in and there’s a safety car because 4 cars crashed on turn 1 lap 1. After 5 laps behind the SC,the restart is about to happen when ESPN does another commercial break.

That’s not ESPN’s announcers. That is the UK SKY sports feed. Then they just auto scheduled commercials.

Which is the problem. The SKY broadcast was n the UK is run with no commercials, ESPN just runs them at a prescheduled time. We all assumed it would be bad but had hoped it would be OK. If Monaco or Austin goes like that when it runs on ABC it’s going to be a nightmare.

I used to torrent the SKY feed back when F1 was on speed and I couldn’t get the us speed channel.

It’s good and your not reminded of the rules every 10 minutes like the US feed did, and had to do.

ESPN’s implementation is the massive problem. I blame freedom the new owners of F1 for this horrible move away from NBC. If it keeps up like this there will be massive decrease in US viewership or most will go to the F1 streaming service when it launches hopefully in the next few months which is also the SKY feed but has about 8 hours of coverage on race day.
 
texasmade
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I know it's the Sky feed and don't blame them. This is solely on ESPN and Liberty for basically thinking US fans would accepting this.
 
Vercingetorix
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I at least used to be able to listen to Alan McNish on the F1 ap during commercials. With the races in Europe being delayed an hour on ESPN that goes out the window.
 
Gwade
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I'm somewhat grateful for the old NBC "dumbed down for American audiences" because my girlfriend picked up the sport quick and loves it now. She roots for Max and liked Steve Matchet's rule reminders...
We both miss our old friends as they've become familiar voices. But that deal is done.
The ESPN/Sky feed feels flat and uncaring. It was a boring race anyway, but the auto-timed commercials during the only excitement without catchup commentary felt like a crap feed.
We both would have appreciated a pre-race introduction to the new broadcast team. I've been a fan long enough to know this will improve. But she doesn't care that much and can turn off easily. Few more races like this and I'm watching solo. Eventually I'll have to make decisions to watch certain races or not. This is what the exec's should be considering.
 
Foo2rama
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Gwade Gwade
I'm somewhat grateful for the old NBC "dumbed down for American audiences" because my girlfriend picked up the sport quick and loves it now. She roots for Max and liked Steve Matchet's rule reminders...
We both miss our old friends as they've become familiar voices. But that deal is done.
The ESPN/Sky feed feels flat and uncaring. It was a boring race anyway, but the auto-timed commercials during the only excitement without catchup commentary felt like a crap feed.
We both would have appreciated a pre-race introduction to the new broadcast team. I've been a fan long enough to know this will improve. But she doesn't care that much and can turn off easily. Few more races like this and I'm watching solo. Eventually I'll have to make decisions to watch certain races or not. This is what the exec's should be considering.

My exact situation my GF loves Max... and started 2 season ago. Although She still doesn’t understand why I cried at Brazil 2 years ago.

And you worded my issues with it better then I did.
 
Timmert
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You guys should have the F1 TV option available soon right?
Commercial free sky stream including all the pre- and post-race coverage.

I understand that their commentary is aimed at more seasoned fans, but I actually like that. The Dutch coverage explains the rules about seven times every race, for the entire season. It just never stops 🤦
 
RJwatches
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Timmert Timmert
You guys should have the F1 TV option available soon right?
Commercial free sky stream including all the pre- and post-race coverage.

I understand that their commentary is aimed at more seasoned fans, but I actually like that. The Dutch coverage explains the rules about seven times every race, for the entire season. It just never stops 🤦

And while explaining the rules mr Mol misses everything that’s happening 🥱
 
texasmade
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Timmert Timmert
You guys should have the F1 TV option available soon right?
Commercial free sky stream including all the pre- and post-race coverage.

I understand that their commentary is aimed at more seasoned fans, but I actually like that. The Dutch coverage explains the rules about seven times every race, for the entire season. It just never stops 🤦
Eventually but I'm not going to buy it for this year since it won't be up and running for awhile. I'll most likely buy for 2019 depending on how much Liberty and ESPN aggravate me and drive me away as a fan.
 
bonerp
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What a boring circuit (sorry to any Aus fans). Nice to see McClaren up there but they got lucky (like Vettel). Nice to see red bull with legs too.
 
jetkins
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Oh how I miss the days of Murray Walker and James Hunt in the commentary box.
 
htiek
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I'd love to go to Montreal for the race weekend. Always wanted to, but something has always gotten in the way
 
jetkins
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Anyone else got a team in Fantasy F1? Join for free, pick your team, make your predictions for Bahrain, and join the Omega Forum league I just created: league # 34412990
 
Wivac
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jetkins jetkins
Anyone else got a team in Fantasy F1? Join for free, pick your team, make your predictions for Bahrain, and join the Omega Forum league I just created: league # 34412990
I'll try and get on to that before the race
 
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