Terrible. Static video, a few text updates, this for a stacked field.
I feel really sorry for the pro field. They don’t matter a jot to the WTC, and get zero visibility from this. Even crossfit outdoes it.
€20 For full coverage each race in ITU.
I’d gladly pay 4x that for good TV coverage (similar to ITU) of 6 - 10 top 70.3’s/140.6’s in the year with a top field.
As it is it’s embarrassing.
It would be nice to have good coverage, I agree.
I completely agree. It’s quite sad that this level of a field garners this level of coverage. I was looking forward to doing some work with St. George on in the background and instead I played last year’s ITU Kitzbuhel on the smart TV. Doing that provides a stark contrast.
I’m surprised that from a business standpoint it doesn’t make sense for WTC to invest in covering these races. It seems like it would be worthwhile to invest in covering around a race per month with a higher level of coverage. Events like US Championships, larger purse races, historic races, and intriguing races. Then pool the prize money to these races and let the pros know what races will have this coverage. From there it seems like the coverage would help on two fronts: driving long term participation (which would directly benefit WTC) and also driving sponsorship. As it stands now at most races, sponsors only really reach the actual athletes who are competing. With some investment in coverage, this number would multiply. It also seems that if the production was professionally done then races may get picked up by a station like Universal Sports. If the ITU and Xterra appear on TV then I don’t see why WTC can’t get a race like the US Championship on TV alongside high quality live coverage. It seems that there would be some other smaller benefits such as getting better terms with municipalities since they will be featured. St. George seems like a perfect example of this, a town focused on tourism that would see the benefit of appearing in a professional production.
Seriously. The top 10 men were all within a minute of each other at mile 2 - and the live video feed is just showing T2 exit…
Same crappy ass Ironman coverage as usual. It’s 2014 and they still can’t get it right.
It really is a shame. This would have been an awesome race to watch. Frodeno running a 109:12 …hot damn that’s fast.
It’s the US pro champs, why aren’t you racing?
I’m starting my season a bit later than I normally do. With a baby on the way and owning a ski shop with my wife, I wanted to make sure to follow through on work through the end of the ski season and then get focused on training and racing. I’m getting into race shape now but I respect the field that St. George draws and didn’t think it would be worthwhile to race there without being 100%. Coming up, I’ll do Memphis in May then 70.3 Boulder.
It seems like there may be some sort of fairly low tech low cost system that would provide us with “moving coverage” from a variety of cameras moving with the athletes. I am thinking something as simple as gopro cameras integrated into a 4G cellular network to a central aggregation point from where the images from the various cameras could even be user selected via Ironman.com. The underlying technology should not be that expensive to integrate and then deploy at various events as long as uses can accept lower quality feed…but that is better than athlete tracker updates at timing mats and static video only at transition. All this is certainly easy to suggest here from the peanut gallery on ST though.
I will ask the guys at Tremblant what the plan is for blow by blow online moving video coverage. Static cameras are insufficient for a sport that is outside of a stadium. We need the cameras to go to where the action is going on.
It’s to keep pro purses low and save Ironman money. With a race with such sh*tty coverage, who’d expect prizes to be higher than they are?
It looks like Kienle and Weiss pretty much lost the race on the swim. They stayed within seconds of each other the whole day with the fastest bike splits by 2+ minutes and very solid runs. But yikes, a 26 minute swim put them out of contention from beginning.
Frodo runs a 1:09 to catch, pass, and beat Brent McMahon in the last mile!
It seems like there may be some sort of fairly low tech low cost system that would provide us with “moving coverage” from a variety of cameras moving with the athletes. I am thinking something as simple as gopro cameras integrated into a 4G cellular network to a central aggregation point from where the images from the various cameras could even be user selected via Ironman.com. The underlying technology should not be that expensive to integrate and then deploy at various events as long as uses can accept lower quality feed…but that is better than athlete tracker updates at timing mats and static video only at transition. All this is certainly easy to suggest here from the peanut gallery on ST though.
I will ask the guys at Tremblant what the plan is for blow by blow online moving video coverage. Static cameras are insufficient for a sport that is outside of a stadium. We need the cameras to go to where the action is going on.
Even a series of gopros on the timing mats would be a step in the right direction.
It seems like there may be some sort of fairly low tech low cost system that would provide us with “moving coverage” from a variety of cameras moving with the athletes. I am thinking something as simple as gopro cameras integrated into a 4G cellular network to a central aggregation point from where the images from the various cameras could even be user selected via Ironman.com. The underlying technology should not be that expensive to integrate and then deploy at various events as long as uses can accept lower quality feed…but that is better than athlete tracker updates at timing mats and static video only at transition. All this is certainly easy to suggest here from the peanut gallery on ST though.
I will ask the guys at Tremblant what the plan is for blow by blow online moving video coverage. Static cameras are insufficient for a sport that is outside of a stadium. We need the cameras to go to where the action is going on.
Even a series of gopros on the timing mats would be a step in the right direction.
…or even more than 2 timing mats out on the bike course for tracking AGers would be nice.
It seems like there may be some sort of fairly low tech low cost system that would provide us with “moving coverage” from a variety of cameras moving with the athletes. I am thinking something as simple as gopro cameras integrated into a 4G cellular network to a central aggregation point from where the images from the various cameras could even be user selected via Ironman.com. The underlying technology should not be that expensive to integrate and then deploy at various events as long as uses can accept lower quality feed…but that is better than athlete tracker updates at timing mats and static video only at transition. All this is certainly easy to suggest here from the peanut gallery on ST though.
I will ask the guys at Tremblant what the plan is for blow by blow online moving video coverage. Static cameras are insufficient for a sport that is outside of a stadium. We need the cameras to go to where the action is going on.
Even a series of gopros on the timing mats would be a step in the right direction.
Let’s see how we can influence the guys at Tremblant for 70.3 world’s. I know they want to tell the best possible story for their events and resort. What better way than having all kinds of cameras all over the course beaming the story to friends of age groupers (and pros) around the world)!
At the pro swim start I saw a camera drone flying over the event, was that broadcast? I thought WTC had it together when I saw that.
Championship race and i got better updates on the day from twitter.
I’m assuming that drone was for a few static photos only as I didn’t see it the rest of the day and it never really followed any swimmers.
If there are motorcycles with refs all around the leaders you would think there would be some way to put a camera (or GoPro) that could film the action.
At the pro swim start I saw a camera drone flying over the event, was that broadcast? I thought WTC had it together when I saw that.
That drone is owned by Washington County Sports Tourism in St. George. Apparently WTC told them to keep it away from the race. I only saw it at the swim staging area for a short time.