Ride London Classic **Spoiler**

doug5_10

Coverage went downhill after the first part which was quite good. London Marathon style with the celeb interviews etc. Once the commentating needed good camera work (heli shots were useless for IDs) and race radio type info (Sagan stopped for a pint perhaps?) even Brotherton sounds shoot. Felt like ASO/RAI etc. had described how to do it over the phone to some Beeb halfwit. Soundproof studio would be a good start . . .

thegibdog

Was the coverage actually provided by the BBC?

argyllflyer

thegibdog wrote:

Was the coverage actually provided by the BBC?

As I suggested up the thread, the graphics were very similar to those used by Sporza. That may be coincidence but the way of showing who was in a break was identical, colours used apart.

majormantra

To be fair I still think it was an improvement on the shambolic Olympics coverage.

dynamicbrick

Given the vast wealth of cycling talent we have in this country, the fact the beeb see fit to only bother rolling out a retired long-jumper to front the biggest cycling event in the country probably tells us how seriously they take it.

Hayles isn't a good match for Brotherton's style, and I felt sorry for both of them struggling with the hopeless tv feeds... Least, what I could hear of them over Cyndi Lauper

argyllflyer

MajorMantra wrote:

To be fair I still think it was an improvement on the shambolic Olympics coverage.

That was provided by Hein Verbruggen's chums at Olympic Broadcasting Services. He's chairman!

https://www.obs.tv/structure_contact.php

argyllflyer

dynamicbrick wrote:

Given the vast wealth of cycling talent we have in this country, the fact the beeb see fit to only bother rolling out a retired long-jumper to front the biggest cycling event in the country probably tells us how seriously they take it.

Isn't Edwards just one of their versatile presenters though?

specialgueststar

whoooaaa so many critics! Live on BBC 1 !! UK public seem happier with Olympic faces. This wasnt just for cycling die hard fans - but for the public as well. Live British race on BBC1 and looks to be a goer for years to come. Don't you ever stop f%$kin whingeing :twisted:

majormantra

We are British, therefore we whinge. I'm pleased that a cycling event has garnered this much coverage and so many participants. It's a great thing to build on.

majormantra

(I do wish the news would stop referring to the sportive as a "race" though.)

specialgueststar

FJS

Moaning about coverage seems all the rage post-TdF. There was nothing wrong with the images and on screen information; I thought it was pretty good coverage. More importantly, it was great to have a day of road cycling on BBC1/2.
Good amount of spectators on the side of the road; a good addition to the calendar.

blazing_saddles

Wow.
I was going to say that it was a pity that the commentators didn't seem clued up on who was the fastest sprinter in the peloton, by some margin. Hardly seems worth it, having read these last couple of pages.
Other than that and one, slightly unfortunate camera position, I thought the production was much better than the Olympics. (the Dutch fiasco)
The BBC give us 6 hours live and folks are still full of venom over minor niggles.

Britain's answer to the Roma Maxima. Has to be the biggest 1.1 production on the calendar.

afx237vi

Yeah I'm normally the first to complain about bad TV coverage, but I thought that was pretty good. One or two minor niggles to be improved next year, for sure, but it's live road racing on BBC1... what are you complaining for?!

The domestic pro teams must be absolutely over the moon... which can only be good for bigger sponsorship and more races in the future.

gpreeves

I agree that the coverage wasn't too bad. Once Hugh was off air the commentary wasn't awful, and the usual information was all there (time gaps and distance to go). Overall it was significantly better than their coverage of the Olympic RR last year, so at least they've demonstrated the ability to improve.

gpreeves

Double post - deleted

deejay

MajorMantra wrote:

We are British, therefore we whinge. I'm pleased that a cycling event has garnered this much coverage and so many participants. It's a great thing to build on.

I am happy to see so many main roads on GB, closed to traffic in one of the busiest area's of the UK.
I was amazed years ago, to see the center of London closed to traffic as I had never dreamed to see such a thing.

Watching the race on BBC coming through Leatherhead to the finish, we agreed the commentary was far better than we have had to mute on Eurosport.
The captions kept us informed about the distance to go and the leaders time gap.
The camerawork was as useless as the ASO events (and TDF) with the Director happy to have just one rider on the screen and the instant an attack started then to cut away.

FJS

BTW, pretty amazing first two seasons for Demare, still only 21 years old

roypsb

I don't understand the moaners on here - thoroughly enjoyed the Eurosport coverage. Also, don't get the sniping at Carlton Kirby who I think is excellent. I guess some people just like to moan.

Really hope this gets well established in the calendar.

Le Commentateur

Coverage OK; race only got interesting by Box Hill though.

Paul 8v

Glad they had time checks and km's left. To be fair, you're average Joe watching it on a Sunday afternoon wouldn't notice all the cockups, as above I'm glad it's been made accessible to everyone by being on the BBC, especially the Women's race which I thought was quite a good watch with all the attacks. For non cycling fans, hours of looking at a peloton rolling along is not that interesting so the crits are a good introduction.

I suppose you have to remember French camera crews have been doing this for years, until recently most people in this country didn't realise there were other sports apart from football...

mididoctors

domestic teams were in that race

Pross

Thought it was a good race and enjoyed the coverage. A full race shown from start to finish, excellent commentary team on the main coverage, highlights of the women's race. I was slightly surprised that Demare's chances weren't highlighted when picking who might win given the lack of top flight sprinters in the field and also surprised that Swift was being included as a favourite with the form he's shown this season but other than that Brotherton and Hayles were a good pairing, identified riders well which isn't easy with so many lesser known riders and managed to be informative without waffling. A bit more close up overhead camera work would have helped at times but accurate on screen graphics were a big plus after the ToP!

Nice to see a few young Brits having a go especially Sam Harrison in the final few kms but FDJ deserved the win for taking the race on when the other Pro Tour teams didn't look bothered. It's a shame the course couldn't be a bit more testing either through hills or technical corners etc. but when coming into a finish in a major city that's always going to be a problem and the finish straight is up there with the Champs or Via Dei Fori Imperiali. With a few bigger names hopefully the race and whole weekend can go from strength to strength.

dynamicbrick

I think the whinging, myself included, is not that the coverage was bad per se, but that given the considerable resources of the publicly funded broadcaster, it could have been so much better. There seemed to be the barest minimum of cameras, no graphics apart from the course map, and having the commentary team within earshot of the live stage a real schoolboy error.

Given the need to appeal to the mass audience, they could/should have done a couple of educational segments about the bikes, the tactics, training, fitness, or whatever - instead they just defaulted to following the race which, lets be completely honest, is pretty dull unless you understand the tactics, or you're just really into cycle racing.

That said, BBC coverage of events has been pretty flaky of late - the Coronation river barge thing was dire, crowned by Fearne Cotton wittering nonsense at veterans aboard Belfast, which herself was introduced as (and I quote) 'the biggest cruiser ever built, displacing 36,000 tonnes' (it's neither, as a 30 second read of Wikipedia would have shown)

dougzz

Somehow I'm always going to cut Fearne Cotton a little more slack than Rob Hayles

Le Commentateur

I found it amusing that Hugh Porter (who handled to web commentary during the gap between BBC1's coverage) resolutely stuck to describing race distances in miles, despite other commentators and all the on screen captioning being in kilometers.

MrTapir

Any idea why commentary changed from Brotherton and Hayles to Porter and Smith? Just to give the other guys a break?

Apart from that i thought it was good, I like Brotherton who says generally sensible things, unlike Carlton's annoying buffoonery. Thought it was amusing when Rob Hayles was calling Matt Dawson a fatty.

I think John Herety will be pleased with his young lad in the break Mike Cuming. And La Pomme Marseille rider in close third place, I like that team. FDJ played a blinder too. I think it was said before (FF maybe), Offredo looks classy on a bike.

Richmond Racer

MrTapir wrote:

Any idea why commentary changed from Brotherton and Hayles to Porter and Smith? Just to give the other guys a break?

Apart from that i thought it was good, I like Brotherton who says generally sensible things, unlike Carlton's annoying buffoonery. Thought it was amusing when Rob Hayles was calling Matt Dawson a fatty.

I think John Herety will be pleased with his young lad in the break Mike Cuming. And La Pomme Marseille rider in close third place, I like that team. FDJ played a blinder too. I think it was said before (FF maybe), Offredo looks classy on a bike.

Cuming was class yesterday, and Simon Yates also put in a decent ride. Both heading towards pro contracts next year, I'm sure. And yeah, FDJ fully deserved that win - great team effort

mroli

RCJLT worked really hard to get in that break and Cuming is turning into a good little rider. The smaller teams and esp LPM gave it a good go and of the bigger teams FDJ were the most active so glad they won. Hard to see how they'd make it tougher - the ride back in is always fast and flat - there's nothing that side that's going to break it up....

Pross

Richmond Racer wrote:

MrTapir wrote:

Any idea why commentary changed from Brotherton and Hayles to Porter and Smith? Just to give the other guys a break?

Apart from that i thought it was good, I like Brotherton who says generally sensible things, unlike Carlton's annoying buffoonery. Thought it was amusing when Rob Hayles was calling Matt Dawson a fatty.

I think John Herety will be pleased with his young lad in the break Mike Cuming. And La Pomme Marseille rider in close third place, I like that team. FDJ played a blinder too. I think it was said before (FF maybe), Offredo looks classy on a bike.

Cuming was class yesterday, and Simon Yates also put in a decent ride. Both heading towards pro contracts next year, I'm sure. And yeah, FDJ fully deserved that win - great team effort

Yep, thought Yates was unlucky - he worked hard to bridge with Offredo and Bauer and then the break started to mess about. He almost got over to Offredo and Waeytens and had he done so maybe they could have stayed away as Offredo was effectively riding on his own trying to hold the bunch at bay.

Decent cluster of Welsh riders in the race as well with Sam, Jon, Owain and Yanto - 3 of them with big futures I think.