Rob Willis

Rumored TV Schedule for 2011 ALMS.

Four races will be shown on a one-week delay on ABC in the shortened format introduced in the 2010 season. Those four were said to
be Laguna Seca, Road America, Long Beach, and Petit Le Mans. The
remaining races will be shown on Versus, except for Sebring, which will
be presented live on ESPN3.

Dolfan

Wow, seriously the Petit Le Mans which is their premiere event, 10 hour race, on 1 week delay????? I guess viewer numbers are down but anyone who would want to watch, probably will know that outcome and not be as interested to watch a week later!

At least for the Petit, I'm glad I make it out to Road Atlanta each year.

gkmccready

Well, I won't be watching the dramatizations that ABC presents. Here's hoping the Versus coverage doesn't suck... they've done pretty well with their NHL coverage.

AverageVetteNut

Wow... no more speed covereage? That really sucks.

I'm not waiting a week, with my fingers in my ears and eyes to keep from knowing the outcomes.

So much for the momentum that the ALMS was seeming to be having here.

davidfarmer

what momentum............? GM Racing may have some momentum (woo hoo, 1 in a row!), but ALMS has been struggling all season, and before.

Hate to see it falter, but this isn't looking good!

AU N EGL

and more and more shopping channels or "Real House Wife's of Big Pine Key Trailer and Adult Theme Park" get prime air time.

Go figure

gkmccready

While I think the ABC coverage sucks, I'm not upset that Versus (and ESPN3) have picked up the other races. I'm willing to give them a shot and see what they do. Versus had the Indy cars last season, didn't they?

0FORGED DST

Or they could put the entire schedule live on Eurovision or even Blomberg TV !!! Versus is better than nothing , though but I would sure rather see it live on any network available rather than delayed and edited.

Poor-sha

Yeah, it is funny the Bloomberg is now a better channel for motorsports coverage than Speed.

dvandentop

Absolutely retarded they better get some more speed coverage or it is going to **** alot of fans off. we need to find someone to write to about this

mgarfias

Can't they just show it via the internet? I can jack a laptop into my TV if needed and watch in high def.

ErnieN85

We have been writing for years! it isn't Speed any more its NASCAR_Vision

quickc6

The Long Beach race is only one hour and forty five long . What are they going to show ,the first and last lap ?

Z06_BluByU

maybe it makes business sense.. the majority of speed coverage is NASCAR.. I think it just so happens that Rolex (the competition series to ALMS) is also owned by NASCAR (bill france). So it wouldnt be a stretch to image Bill said.. you guys want my NASCAR coverage.. you have to drop ALMS.. otherwise i'll take my NASCAR stuff elsewhere..

whats speed channel to do!??! thats the problem with having all your eggs in one basket..

I think this new setup might work out for the better.. last year any race that was on ABC was streamed LIVE on the internet.. without commercials and available on demand for replay.. I'm ok with that setup.. just plug you laptop in to the TV sit back and enjoy commercial free coverage!!

96CollectorSport

I agree I really liked watching the race on the internet, not only was it live without commercials but they had live timing and scoring as well. You could watch the GT2 race on the timing and scoring if they weren't covering GT2, no more waiting for the positions to scroll through after a pit stop. If you haven't tried the internet coverage you're missing out.

Anomir

The problem with faltering viewers for ALMS IS the coverage. It sucks.

Speed covered mostly P cars. A lot of the camera angles just suck. Euro races seem to have much better angles, and as a rule better and more equal coverage of the classes.

If ABC is doing the races I simply will skip those, they suck worse than Speed. I hope that someone will be streaming the races, better than having to miss them.

I will leave my verdict on VS open for now, we will see this season it looks like.

Zoxxo

A bunch of folks writing in won't change economic realities. Besides, I'm guessing that Atherton and crew are quite aware of what the fans would prefer to see and what they (ALMS) would prefer to have happen.

Z//

JEPopp

OK - for those not internet saavy.... what if I can't watch the race live on the internet? Is there a solution to record and watch later?

AU N EGL

The few sponsors that ALMS has may also need to talk to SPEED as sponsors for the race coverage and PAY to be SPEED TV sponsors as well.

Putting a sponsors decal on the race car is a very very small part of sports sponsorship.

95jersey

I think the opposite is actually taking place. I think that ALMS wants to grow outside of Speed. They figure they already have THOSE fan base and only those actually searching for ALMS will ever go watch it on speed (so they are stuck in a rut)...vs. if they do major network, they will get a much larger audience. So I see it as a marketing strategy to bring in new fans and introduce a more friendly, shortened non-racing expert version of the broadcasts. ALMS KNOWS they already got YOU, they want new fans that otherwise might not watch racing on specific speed tv or other racing oriented channels.

Problem with this strategy, and I have seen it fail in similiar business plans for years, is that they will alienate the existing fan base. So to gain 1 or 2 new fans, they may lose 5 or 10 existing fans that expect and love the existing format. I certainely won't bother watching those cheesy network broadcasts and I don't have the other channels previously spoken in this thread.

Not sure if the internet deal is feasible. The only reason you can watch the race on the internet is because it is being broadcasted live by Speed on TV. If speed isn't there broadcasting the show, who will have camera's set up on every corner taping the race with quality commentary? I would bet those CBS/ABC network will NOT provide live internet video of the races. We may be dumbed down to radio ALMS.