Scheduling: The 2013 German Grand Prix

If Formula 1 fans couldn’t get enough of the action, the teams, drivers and machinery very quickly head from Silverstone to the Nurburgring for the German Grand Prix. I suspect only one word will be on many people’s lips though…

Sky’s Classic F1 races this week are 1993, 2000, 2005, 2009 and 2011. Personally, I’m very happy to see 2000 being shown, so I look forward to seeing that race in full again! It is a BBC highlights weekend, meaning that coverage is on BBC One in the evening. There is a potential disclaimer if ~~Andy Murray gets to the Wimbledon final that the highlights could be moved over to BBC Two in the event it goes the full five sets but we will cross that bridge if it comes.~~ – see the bottom of this post.

Also because of Wimbledon, all of BBC’s radio coverage of the sessions is on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra. Here are all the scheduling details you need:

Tuesday 2nd July
20:00 to 21:00 – F1: 1993 German Grand Prix Highlights (Sky Sports F1)
– commentary from Murray Walker and Jonathan Palmer
– repeated on Friday 5th July at 18:00
21:00 to 23:15 – F1: 2000 German Grand Prix (Sky Sports F1)
– commentary from Murray Walker and Martin Brundle
– repeated on Saturday 6th July at 06:30
22:00 to 22:30 – F1: Sir Frank Williams and Nigel Mansell (BBC Radio 5 Live)
– was originally meant to be shown last Wednesday

Wednesday 3rd July
20:00 to 22:00 – F1: 2005 German Grand Prix (Sky Sports F1)
– commentary from James Allen and Martin Brundle
– repeated on Saturday 6th July at 17:15
22:00 to 00:15 – F1: 2009 German Grand Prix (Sky Sports F1)
– commentary from Jonathan Legard and Martin Brundle
– repeated on Sunday 7th July at 06:05

Thursday 4th July
14:00 to 14:45 – F1: Driver Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
19:30 to 20:30 – F1: Preview (BBC Radio 5 Live)
19:45 to 20:00 – F1: Gear Up for Germany (Sky Sports F1)
20:00 to 22:00 – F1: 2011 German Grand Prix (Sky Sports F1)
– commentary from Martin Brundle and David Coulthard
– repeated on Sunday 7th July at 19:00

Friday 5th July
08:45 to 11:00 – F1: Practice 1 (Sky Sports F1)
08:55 to 10:35 – F1: Practice 1 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
11:00 to 11:35 – GP2: Practice (Sky Sports F1)
12:45 to 14:45 – F1: Practice 2 (Sky Sports F1)
12:55 to 14:35 – F1: Practice 2 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
14:45 to 15:30 – GP2: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
16:15 to 17:00 – F1: Team Press Conference (Sky Sports F1)
17:00 to 18:00 – The F1 Show (Sky Sports F1)
18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1 (BBC News Channel)

Saturday 6th July
08:45 to 09:25 – GP3: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
09:45 to 11:10 – F1: Practice 3 (Sky Sports F1)
09:55 to 11:05 – F1: Practice 3 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
12:00 to 14:35 – F1: Qualifying (Sky Sports F1)
12:55 to 14:05 – F1: Qualifying (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
14:35 to 16:00 – GP2: Race 1 (Sky Sports F1)
16:15 to 17:05 – GP3: Race 1 (Sky Sports F1)
17:55 to 19:10 – F1: Qualifying Highlights (BBC One)

Sunday 7th July
08:20 to 09:10 – GP3: Race 2 (Sky Sports F1)
09:30 to 10:35 – GP2: Race 2 (Sky Sports F1)
11:30 to 16:15 – F1: Race (Sky Sports F1)
12:30 to 15:30 – F1: Race (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
16:15 to 17:15 – Architects of F1: Gordon Murray (Sky Sports F1)
18:00 to 19:30 – F1: Race Highlights (BBC One)

Wednesday 10th July
19:00 to 19:30 – Midweek Report (Sky Sports F1)

Update at 21:45 on Friday 5th July – Andy Murray is through to the Wimbledon Men’s final and will be facing Novak Djokovic. If the match goes four or five sets, there is a chance that it could beyond 18:00. If that happens then either a) the F1 highlights will be moved to BBC Two or b) the F1 highlights will follow the Tennis at whatever time that will be. If you are heading out, I’d advise recording both BBC One and BBC Two manually from 18:00 onwards, as sometimes recordings fail if the time or channel changes. The Women’s final should be finished long before 17:55 tomorrow so I doubt tomorrow will be an issue.

Sky Sports F1 – Top 10 ratings (week ending 16th June, 2013) – ratings delayed

Another ratings related holding post as there are no Sky Sports F1 ratings on BARB.

Hopefully we should get the full set of ratings in BARB’s six week cycle. This comment from last week’s ratings post may hold some credibility: “Sky have been misrepresenting the length of some of their programmes to artificially bump up the averages, BARB have not fallen for it, hence the delay.”

BBC viewers to get pit lane stream in HD for British Grand Prix

Viewers watching BBC this weekend will notice that, as part of their Summer Red Button offering that the Formula 1 pit lane stream will be in high definition for the British Grand Prix.

As noted in the BBC live text commentary today: “And don’t forget all the lovely extra camera streams available online during qualifying and the race, including the pit lane feed (also available on the Red Button), driver tracker, on-board, timing screens and alternative commentary.”

The BBC’s post earlier this month noted how the British Grand Prix would be one event via the Red Button available in HD, and now we know what stream that is. The HD pit lane stream will be available to Freeview and YouView customers (channel 303), Sky customers (channel 977), Virgin Media customers via channel 994 and Freesat via channel 980.

Sky’s lack of promotion this week

I know that sometimes I do sound like I am banging a brick wall, this past week it feels like Sky’s promotion department has gone to sleep.

Classic F1 has not had much promotion since Sky began showing it. That had been improving. For whatever reason, it appears this has been a case of ‘two steps forward, three steps back’. Absolutely zero promotion for their Nigel Mansell Classic races last weekend and unfortunately the same goes for their GP Uncovered programmes. The only place where you could get the full details is this blog.

Sky’s own scheduling article omits several classic races (the only ‘Classic F1’ block is actually in the wrong place), Steve Rider’s look at how the British Grand Prix gives you Home Advantage and ignores the feeder series races that will be airing live on Sunday morning.

Apparently @SkyF1Insider gives you ‘the inside scoop on all things Sky F1‘. How many tweets have promoted their supplementary programming? None.

Why show things that you’re not going to bother to promote? No, I don’t know the answer to that either.

24 Hours of Le Mans records highest rating in five years

The 24 Hours of Le Mans recorded its highest rating in five years this past weekend, overnight viewing figures across Europe and in the United Kingdom show.

British Eurosport, which broadcast the entire race live, averaged 77,000 viewers (1.0 percent) from 13:45 on Saturday to 14:15 on Sunday. The race peaked with 248,000 viewers on Sunday afternoon as the race came to a conclusion.

24 Hours of Le Mans – 2011 vs 2012 vs 2013
13:45 to 19:30 – 46,000 vs 77,000 vs 103,000
19:30 to 02:00 – 45,000 vs 39,000 vs 65,000
02:00 to 09:00 – 16,000 vs 16,000 vs 26,000
09:00 to 14:15 – 97,000 vs 76,000 vs 130,000

The good ratings pattern was repeated across Europe, with the Eurosport Twitter account tweeting the following earlier today: “Eurosport has just had its best average LM24 audience for 5 years! 18 million different European viewers watched the coverage in total, up 12% on 2012”

For those wondering, I suspect 18 million is a reach figure, which would be the amount of people that watched at least three minutes of their coverage across Europe.