LIVE TV Coverage of 2003 Ironman World Championship in Kona

Triathlon Forum
1

I would really like to watch this year’s Ironman Triathlon World Championship in Kona Live on television. Does anyone here know what the scheduling will be? Which networks/channels should be carrying it Live? I live in Virginia and have Comcast Cable.

Thanks.

XXLTriathlete

2

From ironmanlive.com:

NBC 2003 Schedule - subject to change - check local listings
2003 Ironman Triathlon World Championship - Airing twice

Sat. December 6th, 2003 from 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. EST  - and -                            
Sat. December 6th, 2003 from 8:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. EST

3

There will be live video streaming on ironmanlive.com.

4

Here’s the link to a more extensive list of TV coverage, including NBC, ESPN2, OLN, and Rogers Sportsnet.

http://vnews.ironmanlive.com/vnews/989348370

Zuikis

5

The bad news is there is no live TV coverage of IMH on either network or Cable TV and there may never be for a variety of reasons.

The good news is that there is outstanding live coverage online at Ironmanlive.com and at a few other Web sites that have updates during the week and on race day multisports.com, right here at slowtwitch.com and a few others. In mant respects the online coverage is “better” than you would ever get on network or cable TV. It can be customized to your needs ie you can follow friends, family and loved ones throughout the day etc . .

6

“The bad news is there is no live TV coverage of IMH on either network or Cable TV”

The networks reserve all their live coverage for things like endless hours of pregame hype for a boring Superbowl, 6-8 hours of live coverage of tennis matches, 5-6 hours of live golf, hour upon hour of cars making left hand turns. Heck, even bowling gets live coverage. A sport like triathlon, as well as many Olympic sports, are somehow deemed not interesting to the masses unless countless “personal” stories are featured. IMH must be edited almost to the point where the race is secondary to the personal stories. Very little coverage is ever afforded to the actual leaders (top 10) and in some broadcasts important things like the brutal conditions at Kona are not even mentioned.

Don’t get your hopes up that we’ll ever be able to see live coverage at IMH or for that matter, even decent coverage at all.

7

I’ve been a triathlete for 15 years. I subscribe to 2 triathlon magazines, 3 cycling magazines, and 2 running magazines. I check several online sites at least once a day. I’m about as die hard a fan of the sport as there is. That being said, even I can’t get that excited about watching an ironman on TV. TV is not public service, it’s a business, there has to be an audience, a significant audience, to get the add revenue that will allow TV coverage. Even this years TDF coverage on OLN, while record setting, had a fraction of the audience that the LPGA gets, and the LPGA doesn’t get much =). 8+ hours of people plodding along solo just isn’t that exciting. I think the summary TV coverage, combined with the customizable live web-coverage is a great combo.