Some details about BT Sport’s MotoGP coverage for the 2015 season are beginning to filter through.
Abi Griffiths and Craig Doyle will be sharing presenting duties again for the 2015 season. Griffiths noted on Twitter that she will be flying out to Qatar on Wednesday, meaning that coverage from Qatar at least will be presented on-site. This was also the case last year though when Melanie Sykes presented, so we will see what happens regarding the remainder of the year.
The rest of the team is the same: Keith Huewen will partner Julian Ryder in the commentary box, whilst Neil Hodgson and Gavin Emmett will be back as reporters. Iwan Thomas is returning, presenting a programme called The Chequered Flag that will air in the hour following the MotoGP race on BT Sport. It will be repeated multiple times after the original showing. MotoGP Tonight is not listed in the schedules for Tuesday 31st March, nor is its counterpart Motorsport Tonight. It is unclear whether the show has been axed, although we’ll soon find out when the schedules for the following week come out.
Update on March 28th – James Toseland is with BT this weekend, so I’ve removed that bit from the article. Also, confirmation from Gavin Emmett in their qualifying show that Craig Doyle and Toseland will be on-site at every race this season, which is great to see and presumably means that the studio has been dumped for 2015.
The Formula 1 paddock heads from Australia to Malaysia for round two of the season. Round two is the first live race for the BBC this season, with coverage airing on BBC One as usual.
Elsewhere, the 2015 MotoGP championship begins on BT Sport. In the second year of their exclusively live contract, as of writing, no details about their coverage have been officially announced, I’ve compiled what we know so far here. As revealed on this blog earlier this year, ITV4 will again be broadcasting highlights on Monday evenings. Also beginning is the IndyCar Series live on ESPN, an agreement which will run through to 2022.
NOTE: Clocks go forward one hour on Sunday 29th March, with the change from Greenwich Mean Time to British Summer Time. The times listed are for GMT on Saturday and before; BST for Sunday and afterwards…
BBC F1 BBC TV – Sessions
27/03 – 01:55 to 03:35 – Practice 1 (BBC Two)
27/03 – 05:55 to 07:35 – Practice 2 (BBC Two)
28/03 – 05:55 to 07:05 – Practice 3 (BBC Two)
28/03 – 08:00 to 10:30 – Qualifying (BBC One)
28/03 – 14:00 to 16:00 – Qualifying Replay (BBC One)
29/03 – 07:00 to 10:30 – Race (BBC One)
29/03 – 10:30 to 11:30 – Forum (BBC Red Button)
29/03 – 14:00 to 16:00 – Race Replay (BBC One)
BBC Radio – Sessions
27/03 – 01:55 to 03:35 – Practice 1 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
27/03 – 05:55 to 07:30 – Practice 2 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
28/03 – 05:55 to 07:05 – Practice 3 (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
28/03 – 08:55 to 10:05 – Qualifying (BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra)
29/03 – 07:30 to 10:00 – Race (BBC Radio 5 Live)
BBC News Channel
27/03 – 18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1
28/03 – 18:45 to 19:00 – Inside F1
Sky Sports F1 Sessions
27/03 – 01:45 to 03:50 – Practice 1
27/03 – 05:45 to 08:00 – Practice 2
28/03 – 05:45 to 07:15 – Practice 3
28/03 – 08:00 to 10:45 – Qualifying
29/03 – 06:30 to 11:15 – Race
=> 06:30 – Track Parade
=> 07:00 – Pit Lane Live
=> 07:30 – Race
=> 10:30 – Paddock Live
Supplementary Programming
26/03 – 07:00 to 07:30 – Driver Press Conference
26/03 – 20:45 to 21:00 – Paddock Uncut: Australia
27/03 – 08:00 to 08:45 – Team Press Conference
27/03 – 10:00 to 11:00 – The F1 Show
01/04 – 20:30 to 21:00 – Midweek Report
MotoGP – Qatar (BT Sport 2)
26/03 – 15:00 to 19:45 – Practice
27/03 – 14:45 to 19:00 – Practice
28/03 – 14:30 to 18:30 – Qualifying
29/03 – 16:00 to 20:00 – Races
29/03 – 20:00 to 21:00 – Chequered Flag
MotoGP – Qatar (BT Sport Xtra)
29/03 – 13:50 to 16:00 – Warm Up
Alongside the big Premier League news from earlier this week, there are a few bits of other news worth reporting on this blog, including Sky Sports looking for a new sponsor for 2015.
Sky Sports F1 looking for new sponsor
Thanks to Jon Wilde over on Twitter for the tip here, alerting me to the news that Sky Sports F1 are looking for a new sponsor for 2015. Santander and BlackCircles.com were their sponsors for 2012, with Rolex and Shell taking over for 2013 and 2014. No idea at this stage who will be sponsoring their programming this season.
There’s a few statistics over on the Sky Media PDF for anyone interested, including a few viewing figure predictions for 2015. The headline one is that they predict a Individual 4+ TVR of 0.98 for their race day programme, equivalent to around 572,000 viewers, which looks incredibly low to me, although it presumably includes Paddock Live and the Track Parade.
Pre-Australia schedule takes shape
Sky Sports F1’s schedule, up to and including Friday practice for the Australian Grand Prix, has been revealed. It is not much different to last year, so isn’t a worth a piece on its own, until the finalised version is released. Either way, The F1 Show is definitely back from Friday 6th March, Classic F1 races are back and everything else is as you would expect.
If you were hoping for a completely new batch of Classic F1 races, you’ll be disappointed to learn that three of the first six races being broadcast are from 2014 (Bahrain, Hungary and Britain). Out of the other three, two have been broadcast before (1990 US and 1996 Australia), which leaves only the 1995 Pacific Grand Prix as a new classic race to the channel.
Over on the BBC, a special Formula 1 themed episode of A Question of Sport was filmed today, presumably for transmission in the lead-up to the Australian Grand Prix. The guests were David Coulthard, Suzi Perry, Kevin Magnussen and Christian Horner.
British Eurosport announce Superbike commentary team
Tom Gaymor will be stepping up to lead World Superbikes commentator on British Eurosport for 2015. Gaymor will be commentating alongside Steve Parrish for the rounds that clash with the British Superbike Championship. Jack Burnicle and James Whitham will commentate on the World Superbikes when it does not clash with the British Superbikes. The channel will also be broadcasting the FIM Endurance World Championship live in 2015.
Over on BT Sport, no official confirmation on their MotoGP line-up, but it doesn’t appear that there will be any changes. I did ask Abi Griffiths about their coverage this season, and the response was that “all will be revealed soon.” So, we shall see.
I find that it’s incredibly difficult trying to quantify how much £5 million really is. So, what happens when a figure of over £5 billion comes along? You’re left thinking “woah”. And quite rightly so. Over three seasons, from the 2016-17 season through to the 2018-19 season, BT Sport and Sky Sports will be paying the Premier League £5,136,000,000.00 (or £5.136 billion), a frankly ridiculous amount of money.
Across each season, that works out to £1.712 billion. It’s difficult to comprehend just how big that number is. But, eventually you can break it down.
– £5.136 billion across three seasons
– £1.712 billion across one season
– £10.19 million per game
In comparison, the Formula 1 numbers pale into comparison. Numbers have never been officially released into the public domain, but the best guesstimates for BBC and Sky combined put the number around £55 million.
– £55.0 millionapprox across one season
– £2.75 million approx per race weekend
Formula 1 is pocket money compared to the Premier League, which may be seen as somewhat surprising considering the Premier League does not bring Sky Sports four times the audience of Formula 1. However, the reach for the Premier League is significantly greater than your typical Formula 1 season on Sky. Whether we like it or not, the Premier League is such a subscription driver for both BT and Sky that both parties are willing to break the bank to get what they want to ridiculous proportions. Sadly, that means that customers suffer as a result, with higher costs, and not necessarily better quality.
Comparing the Premier League live TV rights (2016-17 to 2018-19) to the current Formula 1 rights (2012-18).
It will be another two years before either Sky and BT Sport even begin thinking about the Formula 1 rights. Given that they mention it in every press release, it is pretty clear to me that the BBC are going to fulfil their contract until the end of 2018. I do wonder how much have money Formula One Management have lost as a result of the seven year deal between BBC and Sky. We say that Bernie Ecclestone is good at making deals, but if you’re looking at it from a money perspective, then he lost a massive amount of money by giving in to BBC’s and Sky’s demands in 2011. Seven year contracts are very unusual, the Premier League rights run on three year cycles, for example. Since the middle of 2011, we’ve had BT Sport enter the scene.
I am convinced that, if the Formula 1 rights had been on the market on the past twelve months, then live coverage would have disappeared from free-to-air television, and the value of the rights would have soared. How high would the rights have gone, I don’t know, but you can guarantee that there would have been a tug of war between Sky and BT to get live Formula 1 rights. Assuming that there are no fundamental changes to Formula 1, as we know it before 2018, then I think the next set of Formula 1 rights will be north of £100 million per year.
The main thing though, beyond anything else, is that the money generated goes back into the sport. It cannot go to those outside the sport. If it does stay inside the sport, with a more equal prize structure, then the sport should flourish.
BT Sport are to continue showing the IndyCar Series through ESPN for the next seven years, it has been confirmed.
The announcement today said that BT Sport’s and ESPN’s integral relationship will be continuing, with IndyCar continuing as a result on ESPN. The announcement said that: “Among a wide range of content, programming supplied during the course of the agreement will typically feature the Verizon IndyCar Series, NCAA College Football and Basketball, X Games, the AFL (Australian Football League) and more.”
I assume that the agreement is from January 2015 to December 2022, or something of that effect (assuming BT Sport is still in operation in 2022 and that the landscape has not changed dramatically again by then!). IndyCar has been shown through ESPN UK under BT Sport’s ownership since 2013 after Sky Sports stopped showing the series at the end of the 2012 season.
Motorsport Broadcasting 