Any other Left Coasters give up on the NBC coverage?

[Mellow Johnny]

I finally threw in the towel earlier this week and just watch the NBC video feed the next day meaning that, in reality it's 36-48 hours after it really happened when I watch it.

Not live is just that, not live, whether it's 3 hours delayed or 3 days...

Couldn't stand seeing events listed for "primetime" then wasn't shown then bu in the late night 12:35-2:00am time slot.

Absurd...here's hoping ESPN gets the future bids since they indicate they won't tape delay for the west coast.

[paulthefan]

I wouldnt say I gave up having known beforehand to invest no hope in NBC.

[Mellow Johnny]

I wouldnt say I gave up having known beforehand to invest no hope in NBC.

Good point I wouldn't say I ever had hope I just put up with it anyway at first but finally reached the breaking point with it.

[Davidokun]

I gave up on NBC in 1988, then briefly recanted in 1992 when they offered the Triplecast.

I attended all of the T&F in 1996 and 2000.

In 2004, I didn't watch any of their coverage live, but instead recorded it on my DVR, then played it back later, fast-forwarding through all of the fluff.

I have repeated that viewing pattern this year. In addition, I have muted all of the commentary, and listed to music instead.

[dupontred]

Pretty much watched everything on DVR and then watched at my leisure, fast forwarding through the commercials and beach volleyball.

I highly recommend it. I also taped all the USA and MSNBC coverage too, and FFed through that, too.

[mike renfro]

Yeah, I pretty much gave up. What with watch the evening show for the random snippet (telling when things would air would be defeating their purpose, which is cram the ads in) and having been up pretty early to go online to get the results, I usually fell asleep on the couch during the late nite show. I finally gave it up. Maybe for London, I'll go to the UK and watch it on BBC.

[SQUACKEE]

If i KNEW the races they promised were coming on around 10ish i would have stayed up but we never knew when a 60 min. volley ball match would be sandwiched between the greatest athletes in the world...so i gave up and went to bed early and watched everything on DVR. I didnt have the will power to NOT look at the results as soon as they happened so the whole TV viewing was not what it could have been to say the least.

[bad hammy]

I placed myself in a media-free bubble and then watched it all as if it were live. Doing that kind of sucks, of course, but I want to watch it first before I know what happens from other sources. And of course made heavy use of the DVR to fast forward through the non-T&F stuff.

[Alan Shank]

I placed myself in a media-free bubble and then watched it all as if it were live. Doing that kind of sucks, of course, but I want to watch it first before I know what happens from other sources. And of course made heavy use of the DVR to fast forward through the non-T&F stuff.

I tried to do that, and did for a while. I DVR'd all the NBC coverage from 10-1, 8-12 and 12:30-2, then got up at 7 and copied all the track to DVD. So, I was basically a day and a half behind. However, I accidentally saw something about Bolt's 19.30, so that was spoiled, then I saw some other stuff, so I just gave up and checked most of the results at the IAAF site. I did remain ignorant of the results of the last day's all-final program, and watched them "the morning after the morning after".

I'm not actually all that jazzed about live coverage, because it's so badly done. It's hard enough to follow a race and two field events when you're there, and can decide for yourself where to look; on TV, you're dependent on some director who neither knows nor cares about Athletics. It could be done well, if they taped everything and always went back and showed you what you'd missed, but it will never happen.

Anyway, I have about 14-15 hours on DVD of just Athletics, no commercials and no Carol Lewis, except when she was talking during an actual race.
Cheers,
Alan Shank

[mike renfro]

[quote=Alan Shank]

Anyway, I have about 14-15 hours on DVD of just Athletics, no commercials and no Carol Lewis, except when she was talking during an actual race.

[/quote:1aqvpzt8]

Which, of course, means you will just have to copy over those dvds :shock: Ah, but next year, we'll be there, with a large enough gang to have someone on top of EVERY event, and alerting the rest as to who is up in field events, when they are in the blocks, etc. And, of course, we have multi man and the mad splitter. We done got it made in the shade bro

[jhc68]

All it takes is two simple things:
1) Cover all events
2) Publish a schedule of when each event will be on TV
NBC failed miserably at both tasks. I don't mind that synch diving and BMX were on TV, I just don't want to have to watch them in the vain expectation I might see 2 minutes of some track final sandwiched in between. As someone observed two weeks ago here, the posted schedules were beyond the grasp of any human being.

[odelltrclan]

Pretty much watched everything on DVR and then watched at my leisure, fast forwarding through the commercials and beach volleyball.

I highly recommend it. I also taped all the USA and MSNBC coverage too, and FFed through that, too.

Ditto. I am one who cannot wait so I would get up in the morning and see the results that were completed during the night and those just finishing and would then go back and skip all the garbage NBC spewed and get to the track events. I never did find the men's 1,500 in their coverage. Did they show?

I think the Olympic coverage of track is lame anyway. We never get to watch any field events other than Dwight's recap of what happened.

Does anyone remember the 1979 World Cup where they showed every jump of the high jump. Real drama between Franklin Jacobs and Rolf Beilshmidt (sp). That is some pretty entertaining stuff.

I wish that NBC or whoever broadcasts in the future would sell a package of all the track and field events. They can still do their taping and holding to the delayed female crowd they cater to but for those hardcore fans, we could at least download and watch as we desire.

[SQUACKEE]

i DVR'd everything i could and still never saw the women's 5000! :x

[odelltrclan]

i DVR'd everything i could and still never saw the women's 5000! :x

Come to think of it, I never saw that as well. And Americans were in it!

[Alan Shank]

i DVR'd everything i could and still never saw the women's 5000! :x

Come to think of it, I never saw that as well. And Americans were in it!

Yes, they showed it, or rather some of it. It was, I believe, on the late-night segment, 12:30 AM to 2. I have it. They cut away to a field event and some commercials, but in this race nothing really happened until pretty near the end, so they didn't miss anything significant, as they often do (like the men's marathon this year, missing Wanjiru's winning move).

The men's 1500 I missed; I understand it was shown at about 2:15, and my DVR turned itself off at 2. >:-(. However, I saw the race on nbcolympics.com, the whole race with no commentary. I don't think it's probably still available, but try "Encore Video", then select "Track and Field", click on some video. You will have to watch a 30-second commercial, then the video you selected will come on. Over on the right, then, is a list of other stuff. That's where I found the men's 1500 and also both heats of the men's 5000 - the entire races without any IDIOT commentary. You can hear the stadium noises, including gh or Bob Hersh announcing in the stadium. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any way to download the video, which would be huge, anyway.
Cheers,
Alan Shank