Why you won't see live drag racing on TV (1 Viewer)

[BaldyLochs]

Here's an idea, albeit crazy. Probably could never happen... but think of it: Are you familiar with NFL Red Zone channel on DirectTV/Dish? Each sunday, a studio host bounces you around from game to game across the league, showing only highlights, and cutting in live when any team is in a scoring opportunity, or when they're waiting on a video review call, etc. If you like football - it's actually pretty cool.

So.... could that same concept work with racing? Probably not with drag racing only.... but what about drag racing, stock car racing and/or open wheel? Or Supercross? There would have to be alot of stuff happening at the same time. I'm sure it'd be very expensive to do, and still wold have a limited audience...... but I think I wold gladly pay to subscribe to something like that. So when there's an oil down on the strip - cut to another race somewhere else.

 

[JF]

Heres how live TV would work. The internet!

You set up 4 static cameras at each race.
A view of the Starting line, Finishline, Fulltrack from above the stands and a view of the pits snackbar (For those that don't watch the Super classes)

You tape a microphone to a PA speaker somewhere on the grounds. Or even better get a feed from the tower.

You pay a small fee (Like $5) to get the broadcast and you connect your computer to your Gigantic Flat Screen Monitor and watch. Pick a view, You have a choice of four. No panning, No interviews except what you hear over the PA.

If it rains you watch rain, If TA/FC oils it down you watch cleanup. If the crew chief stands in front of the camera on the satrting line, You see the back of the crew Chief.

Its just like being there.

BTW with the technology today this could be BOOTLEG done at races. NHRA would have a fit and would try to sue everyone involved or Charge them some astronomical fee to do it. But it could be done for those that want it.

Similar to ESPN3 but with less tech and more coverage and sound

 

[JF]

The old Diamond P races were good, but many people forget a couple of things about them:

One thing not to be overlooked about drag racing that has not been mentioned is that every track is the same and it's always the same core group of racers being interviewed and almost without exception, they spew the same spiel everytime a microphone is put in front of them. Thusly, every program looks the same. A casual observer could watch Gainesville and Topeka and see 80% of the same show. And if you extrapolate that out to 23 events = Boring for the casual fan. What's worse is I don't know how you overcome that. NASCAR goes from Charlotte to Talladega to Martinsville and different cars and drivers move to the front and get interviewed. Each week feels fresh and looks different to the casual observer. EVERY NHRA event is 1000ft track, 2 lanes surrounded by white walls (Charlotte 1 excepted, jury is still out on that one). And the same guys are going to keep winning and giving the same interviews for the most part. You have to really care to put up with that monotony.

One thing you forgot to mention is NASCAR and the other sports have ONE WINNER not 7 or 9. I'm not sure how you could do it in Drag Racing but Thats a point that the public doesn't understand.

As in:

Who won the Daytona 500? Racer X did!

Who won the US Nationals? Well, Z won TF, F won FC, E won PS, R won TAD, G won TAFC, U won Comp,T won SC, H won SG, W won stock, L won SS

 

[Nick Name]

John;
Actually Bangshift.coms single camera was great. Maybe they will show some tapes on their sight.

They were at half track and just panned the cars going down track. Their sound was fantastic, coming from a computer.

I would love it if they would replay, on demand, the cackelfest as I missed it.

 

[nedannouncer]

Replay will be running until we do the PSCA Street Car Super Nats from Vegas next month.

Bang Shift : News : Bang Shift Blog -- scroll down and click the CHRR link on the front page.

 

[yoda]

As long as we have ESPN360, why would we need PPV?

And William- no worries buddy- me and the g/f can spend all of Sunday on the couch with hot wings, beer and pizza watching the all day coverage with the best of them.. Welcome to the WE LOVE DRAG RACING CLUB!!

 

[mike]

As long as we have ESPN360, why would we need PPV?

I agree!

I just wish they would find a camera angle that showed the win lights for the sportsman and would place a mic somewhere to pick up the track announcer...

 

[JF]

I agree!

I just wish they would find a camera angle that showed the win lights for the sportsman and would place a mic somewhere to pick up the track announcer...

Martin this is why. ESPN3 does a great job on the pros but fails on Sportsman. Its just cars going down the track, no anoouncing or win lights. If they would just tape a SM58 mic to one of those horns then fine ...ESPN it is

 

[Jon Asher]

Chris Wilt’s comments about the NFL Red Zone are interesting, and the concept, in and of itself, is pretty good, BUT there are some probably insurmountable problems.

ESPN owns the rights to the NHRA telecasts.

TBS and ESPN/ABC Disney SHARE the rights to the Cup races.

Some, but not all, Nationwide series races are on SPEED.

Please don’t flame me if I’ve gotten the ownerships incorrectly, but the point is still the same. Multiple companies own the rights to multiple series.

Why would ESPN, for example, provide footage to The Racing Channel (TRC) that will be broadcast on Sunday afternoon when their own telecast won’t air until Sunday EVENING? They wouldn’t.

Why would Versus, or whatever it’s called, want their live telecast, and therefore, their advertisers, hurt by having highlights of the IndyCar (if you can even find a “highlight” in that moribund series) shown while their own telecast was still on?

The mention of ESPN360 is also interesting, but one thing you must remember is that effective viewing requires a high speed cable or similar connection. Most of the country is not yet hooked up that way.

Jon Asher
Senior Editor
CompetitionPlus.com

 

[mick]

to answer the question of the thread.....'because i'll be there in person
watching it.'
the niche' that is nhra drag racing provides sponsors an outlet to regularly
scheduled races 23x annually on a national cable network on prime time.
the market is small but loyal, predictable, repeatable and stable

IMO future revenue increase should focus on increased event attendance,
and i don't think the recipe for that is altering the TV program, it is
increasing promotions to get people out to the races.
- 2 for 1 admission
- gen. admission available for every race (advertise the LOW price)
- cross promotions with sponsor products = coupon/discount to race
and anything truly unique such as 2010's best fan promotion
kyle busch in PS @ gators.

 

[yoda]

Martin this is why. ESPN3 does a great job on the pros but fails on Sportsman. Its just cars going down the track, no anoouncing or win lights. If they would just tape a SM58 mic to one of those horns then fine ...ESPN it is

The '58 would sound like crap... Best to drop a line from the broadcast truck over to one of those amps that line the track now and take a mono L channel out signal...

 

[yoda]

...
The mention of ESPN360 is also interesting, but one thing you must remember is that effective viewing requires a high speed cable or similar connection. Most of the country is not yet hooked up that way.

Jon Asher
Senior Editor
CompetitionPlus.com

I stream it wirelessly through my kid's XBox on the Internet connection already in the house. The XBox set up gets ESPN360 with service from most internet providers, I think

 

[yoda]

to answer the question of the thread.....'because i'll be there in person
watching it.'
the niche' that is nhra drag racing provides sponsors an outlet to regularly
scheduled races 23x annually on a national cable network on prime time.
The market is small but loyal, predictable, repeatable and stable

imo future revenue increase should focus on increased event attendance,
and i don't think the recipe for that is altering the tv program, it is
increasing promotions to get people out to the races.
- 2 for 1 admission
- gen. Admission available for every race (advertise the low price)
- cross promotions with sponsor products = coupon/discount to race
and anything truly unique such as 2010's best fan promotion
kyle busch in ps @ gators.

ding! Ding! Ding!!

We have a winna!!!

 

[D]

I for one miss the live finals on TNN, you even got bonus alcohol and sportmen finals sometimes. As for the pay per view in the 90's it was only on DirecTV that leaves a large part of the market at that time uncovered, you have digital cable and broadband internet now. Also you have an interesting product with the ESPN3 broadcasts, except they cut those of us overseas out of the mix. I realize that money drives all of this, (as a Denver native I know what clouds mean at the Mile Highs) I know those of us on the 'mater and other forums are diehards but a creative way should be found to make this work, you already have the 75 minute turn around for the pros, when you folks don't scatter parts and you dodge the rain gods events end early (like this year's Mile Highs). I'm not naive, but I'm not doom and gloom either, there are some smart people that could figure this out if they were motivated.

S/F
D
Makati Manila Philippines.

 

[D]

As long as we have ESPN360, why would we need PPV?

No ESPN3 love on Okinawa or when I'm on the road like I am now in the Philippines. Just the audiocast, when you don't get the off the hook buzzer.

S/F
D

 

[D]

One thing you forgot to mention is NASCAR and the other sports have ONE WINNER not 7 or 9. I'm not sure how you could do it in Drag Racing but Thats a point that the public doesn't understand.

As in:

Who won the Daytona 500? Racer X did!

Who won the US Nationals? Well, Z won TF, F won FC, E won PS, R won TAD, G won TAFC, U won Comp,T won SC, H won SG, W won stock, L won SS

I have never believed that, I think the NHRA needs to do a better job of entertaining/educating the casual fan, for example baseball fans (i'm not one) know/have learned all sortss on minutiae K's RBIs ERA etc... . So instead of the SportsMagic/Powerade/GEICO retards handing out five shirts a weekend that time would be better spent using the Winston/Motel 6/NHRA Mobile vision to "indoctrinate" the crowd so they become as rabid as us on the' mater.

S/F
D
Makati Manila Philippines.

 

[clwill]

One thing you forgot to mention is NASCAR and the other sports have ONE WINNER not 7 or 9. I'm not sure how you could do it in Drag Racing but Thats a point that the public doesn't understand.

As in:

Who won the Daytona 500? Racer X did!

Who won the US Nationals? Well, Z won TF, F won FC, E won PS, R won TAD, G won TAFC, U won Comp,T won SC, H won SG, W won stock, L won SS

Umm, no. Not sure where you are but you have to search the internet to find out who won anything other than TF and FC (maybe PS). No tv coverage to speak of, and the "sportsman" show on ESPN is the "alky" show with less than a 3sec clip that shows HALF of the final for any other class. If I asked you to tell me who won SC at any race this year, you'd need at least 10 mouse clicks and maybe a search or two to give me the answer.

Be not confused: to anyone but the racers, the only thing anyone knows about drag racing is John Force and some of those long skinny cars. I just had someone who knew we race come up to me yesterday and tell me how sorry they were to hear about Dan Wheldon, and did that worry me...

 

[camaro]

only way live racing would come close to working is on a 4 lane dragstrip. soon as someone drops oil, transfer the next run to the other pair of lanes. now of course the one problem lies with track workers cleaning up only a few feet away from a 200-300mph passing car, but if its choreographed correctly the workers only need to take cover, 3 or 4 seconds of any given run that generally takes, from startup to shut off about 4 minutes.

 

[clwill]

only way live racing would come close to working is on a 4 lane dragstrip. soon as someone drops oil, transfer the next run to the other pair of lanes. now of course the one problem lies with track workers cleaning up only a few feet away from a 200-300mph passing car, but if its choreographed correctly the workers only need to take cover, 3 or 4 seconds of any given run that generally takes, from startup to shut off about 4 minutes.

This is a pipe dream. The two "virgin" lanes will have nowhere near enough prep or rubber, the teams will have little or no data on them, and you'll end up making a mess of it. Would you go back to the original lanes when they are cleaned up? How do you justify that to the teams that got sent down the virgin lanes? What happens when there are two oil-downs, in the original lanes and the virgin lanes?

I can even imagine a multi-car team in a points battle sending out a car to spew on purpose, just to send the next pair down the virgin lanes, while they sit back in staging lanes watching what happens and adjusting their cars.

Ugh...

 

[Buns]

This is a pipe dream. The two "virgin" lanes will have nowhere near enough prep or rubber, the teams will have little or no data on them, and you'll end up making a mess of it. Would you go back to the original lanes when they are cleaned up? How do you justify that to the teams that got sent down the virgin lanes? What happens when there are two oil-downs, in the original lanes and the virgin lanes?

I can even imagine a multi-car team in a points battle sending out a car to spew on purpose, just to send the next pair down the virgin lanes, while they sit back in staging lanes watching what happens and adjusting their cars.

Ugh...

It's a recipe fooooooooooooor disasterrrr!