David Harmon Eurosport

danlikesbikes

Sorry to ask this question but I am slightly under the weather at present & TBH quite easily confused but can anyone tell me if this means just a 2 month break from commentating or a longer leave. Only reason I ask is quite like his commentating (but I do say that of all of the ES commentators)

If you check out the responses to the last tweet not sure what to make of it.

david harmon ‏@spokesmen 7h
Tour of Turkey next week and them I'm outta here until the Tour. Time to make those changes in life for the better.

david harmon ‏@spokesmen 7h
I'm sure you'll be in good hands over he next 2 months but I've had enough. Time to do some things for me and those I love.

david harmon ‏@spokesmen 7h
I've done all that's been asked of me by Eurosport for a decade and they have given me a wonderful career but I'm off to rediscover the love

Arkibal

What he said, taking a 2 month break, back for Tour.

danlikesbikes

Kind of what I thought but just a few people questioning it on twitter too got be to thinking.

Either way wish him the best & for me will be missed if only off for 2 months but mans gotta do what he needs too

ocdupalais

Never met him; don't know anyone who's met him... Yet instinctively got a lot of time for the bloke.

If only there was some sort of social media mechanism that I belonged to where I could express my good wishes to him...

danlikesbikes

OCDuPalais wrote:

Never met him; don't know anyone who's met him... Yet instinctively got a lot of time for the bloke.

If only there was some sort of social media mechanism that I belonged to where I could express my good wishes to him...

Yes he is a nice chap perhaps you could if not already done so if you wanted to express you wishes to him via Twitter as I and other have of course other social media sites & mechanisms exists to do so

carl_p

Strange tweets really. Taking 2 months off is hardly life changing?? ES need to freshen things up anyway, getting all very samey. Kelly seems bored and half a sleep most of the while.

danlikesbikes

Just seemed to be giving a mixed message, but it is twitter & 140 characters.

Notice he tweeted this morning is def off after the Tour of Turkey for 2 months then back for the Tour. Can only guess it was personal in which case wish him all the best.

greasedscotsman

Carl_P wrote:

Taking 2 months off is hardly life changing??

Depends on what you do during that 2 months.

Anyway, I like his commentary so seems a bit of a shame. Hope he comes back to the Tour a bucket full of passion!

Crankbrother

TBH I'm glad I won't have to listen to his fawning cheerleader act if Wiggins stays at the sharp end during the Giro ...

Harmon knows his stuff but seems to think international tv is a soapbox for his biased and contrary opinions on ex dopers ...

Plus he had started doing impressions of riders in the peleton that were a bit to close to 'allo 'allo's casual xenophobia ...

AndySimpson

I kinda of only heard a part of this, and felt that maybe he'd got the ITV call...?

cogidubnus

More likely Sky if he moves. They seem to be upping their coverage

markmod

Oh no that means more Carton Kirby.... I hope not, I'm personally not a fan of Carlton commentary style... Please get some new blood in Eurosport, until Harmons return.

rick_chasey

*puts hand up*

dolan_driver

markmod wrote:

Oh no that means more Carton Kirby.... I hope not, I'm personally not a fan of Carlton commentary style... Please get some new blood in Eurosport, until Harmons return.

Bring Robert Millar back! He was good the day he commentated on the San Sebastian Classic and he'd be good again.

DD.

cogidubnus

Its been said before but Dan Lloyd would make a good commenter. Pair him with Brian Smith, Kelly or Maggy.

cogidubnus

Rick Chasey wrote:

*puts hand up*

Can you upload a sample of your commentary for us to rate please

rick_chasey

He just seems quite unprepared.

I know he does a lot of sports and it's a tough seat to be in - much easier being aligned to one sport, but there's a lot of homework he doesn't do.

He finds it particularly difficult to identify riders, even when the race numbers are clearly visible.

I resorted to getting the race number lists up infront of me today - helped a lot.

Now of course, the head on shot of some random Frenchman from Europcar attacking requires good experience and knowledge to get, fine, but get the easy stuff right.

He also ramps up the superlatives and excitement in ways that don't reflect what you're seeing.

A more perenial problem with many english speaking commentators (note, not even Phil & Paul do this), is they're too pre-occupied with either picking winners or deciding early on if this is a race deciding moment or not.

"CAN HE STAY AWAY?? ONLY TIME WILL TELL!!". No, you'll tell me WTF is going on so I can enjoy what's going on. That kind of chat a waste of time.

You don't NEED to get all exciteable. Sometimes it'll happen naturally. Otherwise I want to know what's going on. Cycling's often spread all over the place with anything but ideal camera angles so I need a little help as a viewer.

You guys occasionally listen to Belgian commentary on illegal feeds right? They don't do that over the top OMG, GAAARGH, SO EXCITING?? stuff. Yet for those who can understand them, you wouldn't listen to anyone else.

You want easily digestible information and vaguely interesting chat. They go through the same conversations the rest do, but they let what's on the TV inform them. Rather than going "right, after the break, we'll go through all the favourites", they'll wait till they see Canc on the screen, and slip in a casual "he's the favourite isn't he?" and then go into the same conversation. Or Europcar will have a rider in the break "so, is he really riding for leader x? What's he doing in the break today d'ya think co-commentator?" That way it flows and, above all, it reflects what you're watching, and it's more flexible when suddenly stuff happens on the road. You don't have to plow on with naming all the other favourites while sh!t is going on.

thegibdog

Kirby for the whole Giro? I think I'll go insane!

blazing_saddles

thegibdog wrote:

Kirby for the whole Giro? I think I'll go insane!

I think I'll go elsewhere.

Richmond Racer

You're not the only one who'll go elsewhere. I seriously cant put up with Kirby for the Giro.

He was truly unbearable today. A rider pops off the front - 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE INCREDIBLE IF HE DOES!' Others bridge across to him, someone else pops off 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE AMAZING...!'

And so on ad nauseum.

And we dont need to be told many many times that Hesjedal's a decent TT'er - we know for chrissake...

So bloody repetitive.

When was it the other day when he referred to Chicchi as a former MSR winner? :roll:

afx237vi

Cogidubnus wrote:

Its been said before but Dan Lloyd would make a good commenter. Pair him with Brian Smith, Kelly or Maggy.

Has Dan Lloyd ever done lead commentary before? Most of the ex-pros are just there to offer an opinion, however insightful, and not actually lead the conversation. It takes a different skill set altogether to be a lead commentator. Most rugby fans are still having flashbacks about the 30 excruciating minutes when Andrew Cotter was taken ill in this year's Six Nations and Jonathan Davies had to take over the commentary. It wasn't pretty.

afx237vi

Richmond Racer wrote:

You're not the only one who'll go elsewhere. I seriously cant put up with Kirby for the Giro.

He was truly unbearable today. A rider pops off the front - 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE INCREDIBLE IF HE DOES!' Others bridge across to him, someone else pops off 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE AMAZING...!'

And so on ad nauseum.

And we dont need to be told many many times that Hesjedal's a decent TT'er - we know for chrissake...

So bloody repetitive.

When was it the other day when he referred to Chicchi as a former MSR winner? :roll:

The one that made me roll my eyes was "Bradley Wiggins has had to change his bike... [dramatic pause]... AND THIS ONE HAS NO POWER METER!!!"

argyllflyer

Fear not, Carlton won't do the Giro commentary unless Eurosport go completely away from doing their own thing as CK works directly for RCS as their English speaking commentator for all of their races, alongside Dan Lloyd.

Rob Hatch is doing 4 Days of Dunquerque, California and Belgium so he won't be doing it.

That leaves, assuming no prior commitments, Anthony McCrossan, Declan Quigley or Jon Harris-Bass, the only others I can think of who have commentated for Eurosport.

But they could still just go for the Giro's own international feed and give us 3 weeks of CK!

Richmond Racer

afx237vi wrote:

Richmond Racer wrote:

You're not the only one who'll go elsewhere. I seriously cant put up with Kirby for the Giro.

He was truly unbearable today. A rider pops off the front - 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE INCREDIBLE IF HE DOES!' Others bridge across to him, someone else pops off 'OH, CAN HE MAKE IT, IT WILL BE AMAZING...!'

And so on ad nauseum.

And we dont need to be told many many times that Hesjedal's a decent TT'er - we know for chrissake...

So bloody repetitive.

When was it the other day when he referred to Chicchi as a former MSR winner? :roll:

The one that made me roll my eyes was "Bradley Wiggins has had to change his bike... [dramatic pause]... AND THIS ONE HAS NO POWER METER!!!"

Oh, yeah, that was another pearler...

iainf72

argyllflyer wrote:

Fear not, Carlton won't do the Giro commentary unless Eurosport go completely away from doing their own thing as CK works directly for RCS as their English speaking commentator for all of their races, alongside Dan Lloyd.

Isn't that Ant McCrossan?

argyllflyer

iainf72 wrote:

argyllflyer wrote:

Fear not, Carlton won't do the Giro commentary unless Eurosport go completely away from doing their own thing as CK works directly for RCS as their English speaking commentator for all of their races, alongside Dan Lloyd.

Isn't that Ant McCrossan?

McCrossan does announcements at start and finish, CK is in the commentary booth with Dan Lloyd.

So in fact, that's McCrossan off the Eurosport Giro list too.

argyllflyer

A wee behind the scenes with Dan and Carlton at Tirreno:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSHAU27uIcA

RichN95.

For me the role a cycling commentator is mainly to keep me vaguely interested when nothing is happening. When something is happening I'm quite capable of seeing what's going on myself, so I'm not too bothered by what they say.

RichN95.

(From JournalVelo)

argyllflyer

RichN95 wrote:

For me the role a cycling commentator is mainly to keep me vaguely interested when nothing is happening. When something is happening I'm quite capable of seeing what's going on myself, so I'm not too bothered by what they say.

But lots are not capable of seeing things for themselves so they do play an essential role in making the sport accessible to a more casual viewer.

nevman

Even I can tell when a breakaway rider has been misidentified on a poor Eurosport player feed.Drives me nuts when they can't give a gap even

with access to race radios and multiple cameras.Can'thear the babble about the 'favourites' as I am now immune.