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SIS, the company which produces At The Races is the preferred bidder to buy the BBC’s Outside Broadcast Unit as part of the BBC’ sell off of it Resources Divison.
SIS have committed to a long term relationship with the BBC.
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/broadcastin … -sale.html
Could this mean perhaps a renewed interest from the BBC in racing?
Could SIS’s relationship with Sky and the BBC bring racing back to the fore of the BBC’s sports news
I do hope this means more racing on the BBC as they have a decent team in place so why not use them on more than 29 times during the year.
Mind you to be fair to the BBC they prob need a huge O.B. unti to do the silly things like getting a weather reporter to stand in the rain to tell us that it is raining and when a report is needed to scare us about Global Warming then they need to send someone out to the North Pole to tell us in front of a massive iceberg.
Maybe they could even cover the Greyhounds aswell
Crikey, it’s been long enough since they’ve done that, isn’t it. I can recall Gerald Sinstadt covering the odd important midweek evening fixture for Sportsnight, but that can’t have been in the last 15 years or so.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
I know, I remember at one point they did one race a year on the old Sportsnight programme, the tv (televison, not people in their mums clothing) trophy which was always a highlight.
Crikey, it’s been long enough since they’ve done that, isn’t it. I can recall Gerald Sinstadt covering the odd important midweek evening fixture for Sportsnight, but that can’t have been in the last 15 years or so.
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Sportsnight went off air in 1997 Jeremy. That date shocked me, I thought it was more than 15 years ago also.
I used to love Sportsnight, especially the FA Cup Replays when they were trying to get a winner at about the 5th time of asking
I also remember ‘Sport On Friday’ which used to cover such sports as Crown Green Bowls
Mike
Sport on Friday was very good with the late Helen Rollason as they also used to show racing normally from the likes of Goodwood,Ascot and Newbury especially in October when they had a 3 day meet which was Thurday,Saturday on the flat and a Friday jumps card
Also when Haydocks GN trial was a 2 day meet they would show 3 races on the Friday aswellGreat days now sadly forgotten by the Beeb
I doubt SIS will have any role in the BBC’s racing coverage as it is already contracted out to Sunset + Vine.
As for the greyhound TV trophy, I was at 1993 trophy at Belle Vue, and I think there were one or two more on the BBC.
Sportsnight went off air in 1997 Jeremy. That date shocked me, I thought it was more than 15 years ago also.
As recently as that? Yep, I’d presumed it had ended a bit before that. Mind, there’s big chunks of 1993-1998 which I gave over entirely to studying to the exclusion of all else, including racing.
I used to love Sportsnight, especially the FA Cup Replays when they were trying to get a winner at about the 5th time of asking
Heh-heh, and didn’t everyone want to see the end of those ties – the teams, the fans, and the weary commentators!
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
and Newbury especially in October when they had a 3 day meet which was Thurday,Saturday on the flat and a Friday jumps card
That was a fun meeting. It had a "transitional" sort of feel to it, didn’t it – half heralding the end of the turf Flat at the course, half welcoming in the jumps.
I remember the Rosy Brook Handicap Chase, Glynwed International Chase and Flavel-Leisure 4yo Hurdle being highlights. I’m missing a couple of late-90s Chaseforms, but I know the meeting was still going by 1996-7 but had vanished by 1999-2000.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
Shame we dont have more meetings like that or even more mixed meetings.
Only 2 days all year at Sandown and Haydock but im glad im doing both of them.
It works well in Ireland,shame we cant have a Galway style meeting over here
I know someone who works for the OB department as a LGV (Large Goods Vehicle driver) at the B.B.C. and it is run by the unions.
When they covered the Goodwood meeting they were allowed a full day just to drive the truck from West London to Goodwood.
The average speed should not exceed 35 miles per hour.
They are allowed 1 full day to get the cables laid out and a day to recover them. Then another day to travel back to London.
Some of the trucks have sleeper cabs but they are taken to a local hotel in taxis and a security firm look after the equipment over night as it is not in their job description to undertake that task.
They recieve ‘night out money’ this is designed to take car of meals and accomodation whilst away from home and is over twice the rate for the TGWU agreed on yet they are fed and sleep in hotels.
Even when they cover Wimbledon Open Tennis they receive the ‘night out’ money yet most who live in London go home by tube every night.
They are allowed all day to travel from West London to Brighton when they do the conferences. A distance that takes aound 2 hours.
The only way to get a job in the transport department is to have ‘family’ already working in the department.
Visions Mobiles who will be covering Cheltenham next week for C4 and also the C4 Goodwood Festival take less than half the time to do the same job.
No real suprise with an orginisation that pays the likes of Chris Moyles and Jonathan Ross obscene sums of our money.
You only have to look at the BBC’s horse racing coverage on teletext to see what they think of racing.
Absolute garbage is what it is now.
Yet at the same time the results page on the BBC’s racing website has smartened up appreciably of late.
That hardly counterbalances all the entries in the Negative column, but is just the tiniest indication, perhaps, that someone involved still cares enough to make an effort.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
Smartened up? Do you think so?
The results used to appear on 1 page, but now they’re spread out over 3 pages as they try to cram everything in.
I think it looks scruffy.
I do indeed think so, Ted – there’s greater space between each race and each meeting, and the quantity of content has improved.
That will inevitably require more pages than before to accommodate it all, but to my mind a little more recourse to the scroll bar on one’s browser to get through them is no great hardship.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
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