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I don’t mind the ITV coverage – good and bad points but then that has been the same for every iteration from CH4, BBC, ATR and RUK. Chapman is like Marmite and I happen to like them both, Oli is ok in what he is asked to do but a big step up from Rishi Persad or as I like to call him Mr Ask A Stupid Inane Question.
Francesca you can see is growing in confidence with each show whilst Hayley can be more miss than hit and her comments can also be a bit too repetitive. Weaver plays it too safe when it comes to critiquing jockeys – over does it for a good ride and finds excuses for why a jockey hasn’t given an average/bad ride (but then to be fair all channels/commentators are guilty of that) and I like when they send Harvey out to the track to report on the horses at the start. Ed still reminds me of somebody who has been given a job covering something he clearly loves but can’t quite get over the fact that he gets to do it – needs to settle in and hopefully that will come with time/experience.
Holt was the perfect choice as the main commentator (Machin is good as well) but really peed off when Mark Johnston got the back up job with his shouting final furlong commentary, his repeated use of Americanisms drive me up the wall (you are not commentating in the US, they are in the stalls not in the gate) and can someone please for the love of god ban all commentators from using the term ‘they put the race to bed’. A return to giving the race distance in furlongs rather than metres would be good also.
I am in the fortunate position to also be a subscriber to RUK & ATR and so I see a lot of different presenters and to me Luck is far and away the best frontman, I also like Lydia Hislop who is prepared to ask more searching questions and cares less about whether she upsets the interviewee because of it than pretty much anyone else. Candalora is a great addition to RUK but I cringe when the double act of McNae & Willoughby are on as they can be very condescending and pretty much cream themselves over their love of US racing and sectional timing.
Overall ITV do a reasonable job and whilst there is always room for improvement I don’t think they are too far off from being a good racing programme.
Anytime I watch it I find Eds fawning over Francesa a bit annoying and icky. It was funny at the start but he looks like a love sick puppy to me. And I was a big fan of his on Sky football.
Oli Bell perhaps being underused in the roving reporter role – a bit demeaning to see a good presenter asking Derek Smith if Chelsea are going to win and having to swallow the Coolmore PR offensive whenever they have a winner. If they must have Hayley Turner on the team, I’d put her in that role and save Bell for the race previews. Against Weaver, Harvey and the rest (admittedly not strong competition), he’s probably the best form judge they have besides Chapman.
If he was such a good presenter maybe he wouldn’t ask such inane questions and I’ve never thought of him as a particularly good form judge, the best he could come up with regards the Redcar 2 yo trophy today and something he repeated was favs had a good record in the race and if Darkanna was to win she would be the 4th fav in the last 10 years to win. Maybe he would been better off going with the second favs, although the same number of winners the last 10 years they have a £7.33 level stake profit as against only a £1.20 profit for the favs.
All the main presenters on ITV regularly come up with similar stats as though they have some significance to the race we are about to see.
Anytime I watch it I find Eds fawning over Francesa a bit annoying and icky. It was funny at the start but he looks like a love sick puppy to me. And I was a big fan of his on Sky football.
Love can do funny things to us
<p abp=”177″>If he was such a good presenter maybe he wouldn’t ask such inane questions and I’ve never thought of him as a particularly good form judge, the best he could come up with regards the Redcar 2 yo trophy today and something he repeated was favs had a good record in the race and if Darkanna was to win she would be the 4th fav in the last 10 years to win. Maybe he would been better off going with the second favs, although the same number of winners the last 10 years they have a £7.33 level stake profit as against only a £1.20 profit for the favs.
<p abp=”178″>All the main presenters on ITV regularly come up with similar stats as though they have some significance to the race we are about to see.
[/quote]
All too often the stats have nowt to do with anything. When they tell you that a three year old has only won the race in the past ten years, it ignores the fact that out of say 100 runners, there have only been four three year olds…..or only one grey has won it in the past twenty years. I’m wait9ing for the time when one of the clowns tells us that a chestnut has never won the ‘greys’ race.
All the main presenters on ITV regularly come up with similar stats as though they have some significance to the race we are about to see.
And long may it continue. Creates a bit of value for the rest of us.
All the main presenters on ITV regularly come up with similar stats as though they have some significance to the race we are about to see.
And long may it continue. Creates a bit of value for the rest of us.
Hmmm – Francesca, Ed, Olly & Rishi moving the markets with useless stats
Matt Chapman calling people idiots
5 mins earlier he was running off course like a mad man, leaping over the railings and almost kicking someone in the face
Gaelic Warrior Gold Cup Winner 2026
<p abp=”337″>Oli Bell has been a real star.
When do you leave to ride in the Pardubice?
Chamberlin & Cumani lack knowledge and often come out with daft stats, nearly as bad as Tanya’s.
They might even be Tanya’s.
I haven’t been watching the ITV coverage frequently enough to know whether it is a permanent arrangement, but on perusing the credits at the end of the Ebor meeting coverage last month I noticed that Tanya got a credit as statistician.
Whatever the permanence or otherwise of this development, it seems to have been kept awfully quiet.
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.
Chamberlin & Cumani lack knowledge and often come out with daft stats, nearly as bad as Tanya’s.
They might even be Tanya’s.
I haven’t been watching the ITV coverage frequently enough to know whether it is a permanent arrangement, but on perusing the credits at the end of the Ebor meeting coverage last month I noticed that Tanya got a credit as statistician.
Whatever the permanence or otherwise of this development, it seems to have been kept awfully quiet.
gc
Thanks for that Jeremy, not noticed that but have several editions including all the Ebor meeting on tape, will watch out for it in the credits.
Wonder how much she gets for that? Money for old rope.
Just like when she got paid to mark racegoers cards at Newmarket, a Tanya’s Tip feature would appear at the bottom of each race alongside a picture of herself just in case someone needed enlightening
Talk about state the obvious and needless to say she doesn’t feature in the racecard now. 
Things turn out best for those who make the best of how things turn out...Thanks for that Jeremy, not noticed that but have several editions including all the Ebor meeting on tape, will watch out for it in the credits.
No problem. It might only be the extended version of the credits at the end of a Festival week that she appears in; I spotted her name quite by chance at (I think) the end of the Ebor Saturday, after what seemed like at least a dozen pages of preceding credits, possibly more.
A very cursory Google search during my tea break has failed to find any mention by her or anyone else of this arrangement, and she does not have a Directory of the Turf entry that might otherwise have been updated as appropriate.
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.
No problem. It might only be the extended version of the credits at the end of a Festival week that she appears in; I spotted her name quite by chance at (I think) the end of the Ebor Saturday, after what seemed like at least a dozen pages of preceding credits, possibly more.
A very cursory Google search during my tea break has failed to find any mention by her or anyone else of this arrangement, and she does not have a Directory of the Turf entry that might otherwise have been updated as appropriate.
gc
Had a quick look through at the end of my recordings, surprisingly there were no credits at the end of the Hungerford Stakes day coverage or the first day of the Ebor meeting.
As you say extended ones at the end of Ebor day and it was there in black and white – Statistics – Tanya Stevenson – Wonder how long this has been going on? They kept it quiet, bet shes on a monkey a week for producing the rubbish for them. They could get it out of the Racing Post for free
I’ve never understood why someone with so little talent, negligible broadcasting ability and a failure even to be able to string together a coherent, fluent and grammatical sentence could have so many employers as Tanya Stevenson.
She was an absolute joke and was one of those people who get lucky by having an indulgent boss who over-promotes them. She started as a back room girl who was given a chance reading out the emails on the Morning Line on Channel Four.
If she’s now proving so indispensable that she has been given a behind the scenes jolly providing statistics for ITV, it’s a sad reflection on the state of affairs. Some people just manage to keep clinging on to the gravy train.
We’ll be seeing other Channel Four rejects popping up in the ITV credits next.
How about Simon Holt as a “technical operator” (holding the microphone for the much inferior and smug Richard Hoiles) or the dapper Mike Cattermole as a “make-up consultant” for Francesca Cumani?
Talk about state the obvious and needless to say she doesn’t feature in the racecard now. 
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