olympic sailing BBC 7.25pm tonite

Is anyone else as disappointed with the BBC converage as I am? I watched quite a lot yesterday, and the main focus was the cycling (which we lost), broadcast on both BBC and interactive. Other sports we concentrated on were weight lifting (no medal hopes), judo (we lost), hockey, and womens beach volleyball (hmmm).

For the sailing (where we have excellent medal hopes), all I saw was a brief interview, describing how wild and exciting the conditions had been.

What's the BBC's problem?

Rich

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I've emailed BBC on their Olympic site to complain. I think that lots of people need to!

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They actually carried the second mens 470 race live on the interactive service - but of course they don't publish a schedule to let you know. It looked like stunning sailing in the strengthening winds.

Unfortunately the coverage was not very good - they didn't seem to have the right camera angles for you to be able to make sense of what was going on.

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BBCi is a great way of watching if you know the sailing is happening. The 470 racing was compelling- they were hooning along in over 20kn of wind.

Press your RED BUTTONS everyone.

<hr width=100% size=1>Life's too short- do it now./forums/images/icons/wink.gif
 
For heavens sake!

They gave almost unabridged coverage of Henman getting unceremoniously dumped...you cannot have it all. Especially when coverage of such "sports" as synchronised diving does not require a cameraman to miss out on the full breakfast for fear of feeding the fish!

<hr width=100% size=1>When God invented time he didn't give me enough of it. ND!
 
Re: For heavens sake!

Agreed, BBC were struggling to get in all the great British performances

Henman losing the Tennis, Cooke missing out on a medal, Fallon losing the Judo, Swimmers failing to make the finals. It's not surprising that they couldn't fit in coverage of Shirley or Ben, both of whom won both their races yesterday. After all "Henman Crashes Out" is so much more dramatic than "Ben wins again" /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

The way things are looking at the moment the sailing could account for half the gold medals we win at these games...

To be fair though you can't blame the Beeb for the quality of the footage, they are at the mercy of the host broadcasters who do not seem to be doing a good job with the sailing.

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Re: Cameras are 50% to blame

Its partly the poor film footage provided, I assume, by the host nation.

With a bit more effort we would be getting shots with vibrant colours and close up sequences of pretty suntanned girls with pensive expressions looking up at sails and talking tactics.

Instead we have long distance telephoto camera work with washed out colours taken from a single perspective so that even experts have trouble following the race.

I blame the worldwide sailing organizations for not laying down the law to the Olympic Committee before agreeing that our sport can be represented. Perhaps the sailing world should hire Bernie Ecclestone.

Shore side the blame lies squarely with the BBC. They just aren’t trying and its so frustrating because the average sailor is far more articulate in front of the camera than some 22 year old oik from Coventry who's total life experiences of the past 10 years has been the training lane at the local lido.



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It is not fair to complain about the cycling road race, in which Nicole Cooke was a genuine contender, being preferred for coverage of one of an 11 or so race series in the sailing. In termes of time, I expect there will be more coverage of British sailors than any other british atheletes. It just takes so much longer to find a champion sailor than a champion air gun shooter. There is a fair amount of coverage on BBCi although the presenting and the production oculd both be a lot better.

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I've nothing against the cycling road race - I'm a cyclist myself, and I did watch it!

However, the simulcast on two channels was, I though, a bit excessive. At the start of the program, they implied that they would be keeping up with the road race, and would be with it at the conclusion. And that in the meantime, sailing would be covered.

In the event, the coverage was almost exclusively of the race. Which, as races go, wasn't really all that exciting.

I hope that you're right about there being more coverage of sailing competitors than any others in terms of time. But, as far as the terrestial/freeview channels are concerned, I doubt it.

Rich

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Where are you seeing the BBCi schedule?

I found one program by chance - but can't find a schedule anywhere

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I watched Shirley Robertson's second race in its entirity. There is a listing for "schedule" on the blue drop down menu, but I have not tried to use it. Over the weekend I havd the luxury of time to sit and take it all in. As someone who has competed in cycling, swimming and rowing as well as sailing there was generally something on to interest me. All of these are sports which need more coverage so please don't knock the coverage that they receive at the expense of sailing. What gets my goat is the full on coverage of domestic football when we should be concentrating on the greatest sporting spectacle on earth (Barring the Elie Stern chase of East Lothian Yacht Club of course).

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>>> It is not fair to complain about the cycling road race, in which Nicole Cooke was a genuine contender, being preferred for coverage of one of an 11 or so race series in the sailing.

Will the final race of any sailing discipline with Britain in serious contention for a gold medal be given as extensive coverage on BBC1 or BBC2? I'll fall off my chair in surprise if it is!

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Ah - I've found an on line schedule. Unfortunately it is all in the middle of the day when I'm at work. I don't think it is feasible to try to set the Video to record automatically from the Interactive Channel.

I wonder what my chances are of teaching the First Mate (a) how to use the video and (b) how to access the interactive channels on cable.

Vanishing small I'm afraid - might have more luck with the 15 month cabin boy /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

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To be certain of coverage you need to throw a sicky or "work from home".

I happened to be reading a copy of the Sun at lunchtime (don't ask). 3 pages of olympic coverage (a fair proportion of that being a picture of a brazilian beach volleyball players bottom and comment on the Greek sprinter motorbike event) and about 20 pages of footy. No sailing.

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BBC Olympics coverage

Just how many BBC presenters/commentators are there out there, what with camera crews etc would love to know how much we TV licence payers are paying, in flight costs, hotels, expenses and of course wages. Why 2 commentators on the Tim Henman tennis match one of which wasn't even English don't we have enough home grown experts of our own??
Mind you if you think the sailing coverage is bad what about the equestrian team hardly a mention. Rowing doesn't fare much better either.
I do wish the commentators would stop pontificating and let us just watch some action instead
and yes I have written/emailed to the Beeb......

Rant over

<hr width=100% size=1>If work was so good, the rich would have kept more of it for themselves.
 
Re: Send her home

I just watched the shore side interview with the UK sailing team manager following the Ben Ainslie win after lunch.

Please would the BBC send home that dippy woman who is the TV interface to the most promising Olympians in the whole UK team. The woman is not professional enough to be trusted to do an interview at a stray dogs home for a regional news program.

I now grip my chair in a mixture of anxiety and embarrassment the moment she appears on screen, does she know anything about sailing and where did she originate from?

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Re: Send her home

And then the only bit they show is Ben going down wind on his own!

How about some starts/first mark roundings (when its busy) the shot they showed could have been filmed in Weymouth, although it looked a bit warmer.

Totally agree with the dippy brunette comments...its painfull to watch

Any way its back to work now...

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