Giving up on the Olympics

I agree with everyone here on the pathetic NBC coverage of the track and field events. It's bad enough they hardly show any of women's 10k but at least put some video out on the website. I really think their website sucks in terms of video highlights.

I'm just a fan of Michael Phelps as everyone else but enough already. This is getting to be 24/7 Phelps coverage. Bob Costas has his head so far up Michael Phelps ass they doesn't even know what going on with anything on the track.

In my idea of heaven the Olympics would be broadcast on PBS. Relatively no commercials...

Have you ever been to Scandinavia and watched events like the Birkebeiner, Vasloppet, etc? CONTINUOUS coverage, with a low-key announcer keeping you updated on current placings.

Again...damn socialists.

Toivo wrote:

Have you ever been to Scandinavia and watched events like the Birkebeiner, Vasloppet, etc? CONTINUOUS coverage, with a low-key announcer keeping you updated on current placings.

Again...damn socialists.

It's cultural.

In most of europe the announcers are low key, they don't increase the decibels as a race progresses like the north americans do. You never hear them shouting how awesome the effort we are seeing is.

Their job is to inform the viewers and that's all they do. The American commentating consists of pretending to be the biggest fan of the man in front. It is annoying and stupid.

I was in Europe during the Barcelona games, and the tv coverage was excellent. For example, they showed every lap of the HEATS of the women's 5km.

NBC sucks.

theDAWG wrote:

Even kids who are watching cartoons would rather watch live steeple.

Right on! This is my favorite comment ever in the history of letsrun.

I don't understand why people say that the NBC coverage sucks. I actually think it has been great. They should almost the entire 10k for men, didn't they show the whole women's marathon and the 1500m heats?

The US team has looked like sh!t so far on the track so why should they be showing the track races? They are concentrating on those that actually look like they are there to compete.

I mean NBC showed the entire 30 meters that Teter ran.

As a Canadian and able to get coverage of both NBC and CBC here are my observations.

Our Athletes are pretty uncompetitive in most track events but they do a pretty good job of covering the events even though we have no chance of winning. I tried watching last night and they were showing our baseball team lose 1-0 to Japan (yawn) and then they showed Russia v. Poland in Volleyball (WTF?). Instead I switched to NBC to watch the track coverage. WTF!!! What kind of propagandist state are you living in? If you are not American you aren't getting coverage, not even a snippet. They talk 24/7 about the Americans competing but nothing about anyone else (except maybe Bolt). In the womens steeple they knew who Willard was but not Barringer. At the finish they said, and there's Willard finishing but right in front of her in an AR was Barringer but no mention. No clue about distance runners that's for sure. The womens 10k coverage was very poor and most of what they showed was Flanagan and her mom and very little of the epic battle upfront.

It's funny to read also that most Americans are sick hearing about Phelps 24/7 as well. Enough already.

The womens marathon coverage was really quite intermittent as they would cut-out to show rowing. I'm glad our rowers are able to win medals in that event but really other than every 4 years who cares so who follows it other than rowers?

Because the live coverage of the marathon was so intermittent I was able to watch uncommented, unedited, uninterrupted live start to finish coverage on the internet but the coverage for me at times was so slow like watching a slide show but it was an option.

I agree with you that for the people on this board they would love to see the distance races from start to finish, but how many other Americans do think really watched the 10k on tv when it was on? I commented to my wife that we were so excited to see it but I bet most people started flipping channels at that moment.

The average American does not care at all that some one named Bekele outkicked people named Sihine and Kogo. They would rather see an interview with Phelph's mom talk about the diversity he faced growing up rather than people run races that they don't like with guys winning with names they cannot pronounce.

The point here is, especially when you take into consideration Joe Battaglia's quote that was posted a while back, there is no point.

It is thoughtless and idiotic, regardless of how NBC wants to spin their reasoning.

If they don't want to stream their video online because they want to save it for primetime and get more ad money, then why not make us sit through an advertisement for each video we'd like to watch online? Now, that is a captive audience. I practically go to bed each night hearing Morgan Freeman's voice in my head from those Visa commercials. It'd be the same if I were forced to watch it online instead.

The other point to be made here, is that on my cable lineup, I have two channels that are completely devoted to soccer and basketball. The games are usually broadcast live, but then the channel sits dormant for 18 hours waiting for the next games to start. Either Track deserves its own channel like this, or this dead air can be filled.

Either way you cut it, the outcome is infuriating.

Does NBC own those channels?And if they thought enough people cared then they would do that. Do you think handball, beach volleyball, or weight lifting should have their own channels? Or is it just the sports that you are interested in?

Fed Up wrote:

The other point to be made here, is that on my cable lineup, I have two channels that are completely devoted to soccer and basketball. The games are usually broadcast live, but then the channel sits dormant for 18 hours waiting for the next games to start. Either Track deserves its own channel like this, or this dead air can be filled.

Either way you cut it, the outcome is infuriating.

wait!?! wrote:

Does NBC own those channels?

And if they thought enough people cared then they would do that. Do you think handball, beach volleyball, or weight lifting should have their own channels? Or is it just the sports that you are interested in?

I don't think track should necessarily needs its own channel. But if say for instance you are a handball fan, you have no problems accessing coverage to any of the games. Not only do they stream the games live online, but then put up full replays afterwords of the games.

The frustration with track has been that NBC has made it very difficult to access coverage of it. Take the 3000 women's steeple for instance. NBC very easily could have showed it live or a slight tape delay (I don't know what time the race actually went off). They chose not to though and decided to save it for later, which would be fine if they showed it in prime time, except they showed it at 2 A.M.

So not only do they not let you see it live, which you could with handball, weightlifting, archery, equestrian, etc., they won't even let you see it period until some 18 hours after the fact when most people are asleep.

It's not even a matter of getting special treatment with it's own channel, it's a matter of even being on par with other sports that very few people in America care about even compared to track.

someone wrote:

I don't understand why people say that the NBC coverage sucks. I actually think it has been great. They should almost the entire 10k for men, didn't they show the whole women's marathon and the 1500m heats?

I have to agree with this. I think they have shown a lot of track. The problem is that since track has not been shown in large blocks, there is a lot of other stuff to sift through. I have been recording everything I can, then fast forwarding through most of it to the track events. Then my only problem is staying away from Letsrun long enough that the inconsiderate knuckleheads on here don't ruin it for me.

I tape it at night and then fast forward through all the junk and just watch the races the next morning.