Formula One - 2018

.... and off we go........

http://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/20912083/espn-secures-us-formula-one-rights-2018

"Beginning with the Australian Grand Prix in March(2018), every race will air live on the ESPN, ESPN2 or ABC. The package will include every practice and qualifying session and involve more than 125 hours of F1 programming across the first season."

I hope they keep Hobbs and Mattchet as the announcers. 

I would love it if Steve matchett was no longer able to speak.

His insight is usually wrong as he is saying it and he always over reacts.

My wife, who enjoys napping during f1, even calls him out, often.....

I like Will Buxton. The others are very "meh" to me. If ESPN hired Bob Varsha, Will Buxton, and Mark Webber I think it would be fantastic to watch.

One thing to note- Liberty is F1, Comcast is NBC.  

So this split was almost inevitable.  

Will I still have to learn how to record those events on the other side of the planet?

759NRNG said:

Will I still have to learn how to record those events on the other side of the planet?

If you don't understand a DVR, how do you understand F1 tech?

You guys need to figure out how to steal Canadian TSN. They broadcast all the SKY Sports coverage  It is leaps and bounds above the NBC coverage, and I'd bet it will be better than ESPN, too.  Martin Brundle alone is worth the price of admission.

If you read the press release, it sounds like ESPN might just play the world feed, including the announcers.  I'd be just fine with that!

I strongly dislike ESPN. Their strategy seems to be to make anything into "reality" TV. I get enough of that during the olympics. I don't need a faked touching story about some competitor that you want to highlight. Show me the sport let me see them unfiltered. I long for the days when the commentators on Speedvision would often just be silent for good long stretches. At least is feels like good long stretches compared to the constatalk method employed by everyone else today.

Do people really want to hear someone talking about what you are already watching? I could see if they let us know about stuff off camera but damn.

I guess I will have to see if I even get ESPN2. I usually try to make sure I am not paying for ESPN channels. 

^Sling TV.

"Daniel Ricciardo says he hasn’t discussed extending his Red Bull contract beyond next year as senior team figure Helmut Marko said he will be on the market for 2019."

I find the wording interesting.  On the market with Red Bull wishing to re sign him, or on the market, kicking his lunch pail down the street?

z31maniac said:

759NRNG said:

Will I still have to learn how to record those events on the other side of the planet?

If you don't understand a DVR, how do you understand F1 Cuz bro it speaks to me .....a dvr what?? BWaHahahaa!!!!!

So it was recently announced that Alfa Romeo is returning to F1!  

Well, so they claim.  The brand is being attached to the Ferrari Jr team, Sauber.  And they are running Jr drivers, too.  With Ferrari engines.

I don't really see this any different than Nissan/Infinity vs. Renault.  Badge engineering.

If it mattered, it's been over 30 years since Alfa was in F1, and they hadn't done really well for over 60 years.

But I don't think it does matter.  

It is ironic that Alfa Romeo is returning via Ferrari, when Ferrari (the team) was born from Alfa Romeo.  

Would like more of Max V dive bombing  Lewis......oh and is there a glimmer of hope with HAAS???

Rusnak_322 said:

I hope they keep Hobbs and Mattchet as the announcers. 

Ugh, NO. Cannot stand Hobbs on commentary. I respect what he's done as a racer, but I would prefer he had stayed just a racer. There's a reason I usually waited until after the race, then watched either Channel 4 or Sky coverage.

But they're done. I read elsewhere that ESPN will be using the world feed, so it'll be Brit announcers. Hopefully without a commercial every 3 laps. This is potentially very good news for F1 in the US.

You know what's really impressive? They've already released the schedule! I never could figure out what channel NBC was going to broadcast on, and here ESPN has it figured out already. Maybe I'll actually watch some live races next year.

They should just buy the rights to Sky sport sound feed.  Martin Brundle and David Croft in the booth with Ted Kravitz in the pit lane.  I love that and can't stand the US broadcast in comparison.

I notice that although Ferrari have got Charles LeClerc into Alfa / Sauber Giovinazzi is just the reserve driver with Marcus Ericsson has kept his seat due to his strong ties with the Longbow who own the team. 

Given that Wehrlein has been replaced by LeClrec at Sauber I'd love to see him land a seat at Williams.  While it would be a wonderful tear jerker of a story for Robert Kubica to come back, once that story has played out he's still a 32 year old at 90% capacity rather than a promising 23 year old who recently won the DTM champ who normally outscored Ericsson this year in the frankly awful Sauber.   

Berk.  I don't have cable and ABC won't come in on my HD antenna.

Oh well... I think I was able to watch one race this year - Mexico, IIRC the one when Hamilton clinched the title.

I second the Sky feed. I really like everything about their coverage, except that TSN in Canada cuts for commercials through the race, and since Sky doesn't know we missed that ninety seconds, no replays. 

Funny that Ferrari just brought back Alfa Romeo. After threatening to leave F1 for not being treated (paid) well enough. And the old school saying install Bernie and let him pay them.  I say new owners new deal. And Ferrari would stay (and not start up Formula One by Fiat) if Lamborghini was brought back. 

Ferrari can't leave F1. It's too much a part of the brand, and they're a brand far more than they're a car manufacturer. Bernie always blinked when they played chicken, I don't know if Liberty will or not.

No, what I suspect we're going to see is that we'll get the World Feed announcers, they'll insert even MORE commercials (gotta pay for those licensing fees somehow, and they presumably outbid NBC), and now we won't even have announcers being aware of the fact that the commercial break happened.  So we'll hop back mid-sentence, with no review of anything that happened during the break.  Why is Hamilton now behind Vettel?  You'll have to go check the news report afterwards.

I like Matchett, Varsha was pretty good, and while Hobbs is prone to "senior moments" mid-broadcast these days, he's still better than that scenario above.

I think a guy could make a legitimate argument that F1 could be better without big red F cars.  They take a massive portion of the money, even when they get their asses handed to them on the track.  Split that money up with a good portion going to the bottom teams, and you might see a 30 car grid again.  The argument from Bernie was always that F1 would be the loser if Ferrari pulled out.  Maybe...

Streetwiseguy said:

I think a guy could make a legitimate argument that F1 could be better without big red F cars.  They take a massive portion of the money, even when they get their asses handed to them on the track.  Split that money up with a good portion going to the bottom teams, and you might see a 30 car grid again.  The argument from Bernie was always that F1 would be the loser if Ferrari pulled out.  Maybe...

None of the facilities are set up for a 30 car grid.  Not enough garages, etc.

Well, maybe we'd get back up to a full grid again at least. And if the lower teams have more money, maybe we'd get some closer racing.

Not that close racing has historically been a big thing in F1, honestly. Even Can-Am was just a parade most of the time, and it's viewed as the pinnacle of minimal regulation racing. But I'm all for more cars.