Speed Channel can be so annoying at times. A 2 hour break during the 12 Hours of Sebring to bring us NASCAR qualifying. Yeah, just what I want to see, going around in circles one at a time. Even more of a snoozefest than watching 42 cars going round and round at one time. There is so much great racing out there they could bring us, but no, being part of the fair and balanced Fox network gives us Fox like sensationalistic crap.
It's not only the NASCAR stuff. I could live with the races they show, it is billed as racing after all. However, all the contrived crap they now have. Shows such as Pass Time, Dangerous Drives and this ridiculous product placement driven drivel like Bull Run.
I think you meant Magnaflow Bull Run. Yes, you are correct, the problem is much more than just NASCAR.
I'm happy to trade all the stuff I don't like on Speed for the fact that they cover every day of all the F1 races (although some races are on Fox). In theory I'd love to see more variety of race series, but the reality is that I wouldn't watch much of them anyway. I wish they could at least find room in the schedule for same-day showings of things like GT races that they do cover.
nascar ? ....is that that country boy, tobaco chewing, budweiser swilling, cutoff plaid shirt baseball cap motorsport ? I always thought that they were a bunch of locals who rented a track for the weekend and painted up their cars. That's a real race ? Huh....
...and then Alexander Wurz drops a classic, blatant f-bomb during the live post-race SPEED interview followed by apologies from SPEED. :cornut:
That happens every once in a while. They need to do the same thing some radio shows do, add in a 30 second delay (+/-) at the start of every live broadcast and have a big red mute/bleep button the producer can use to clean up things like that before they make it out on the air.
There's also Versus and HD Theatre, both of which can have some pretty good racing series on and as the name says - shot in amazing HD
Just be glad that you DO have Speed Channel. My local cable company decided to drop Speed two years ago. Don't know what you got till its gone...
ironic that the advertisement on the side of the page while I read this thread is for the the NASCAR show on Showtime. the reason you see so much NASCAR on Speed is because NASCAR has such a huge fan base. If other racing series had a larger following, you would see more of it on tv. that's the simple truth. I'm a big NASCAR fan....I'm a big fan of racing in general. And I drive a MINI. I don't dip, chew, drive a pickup, raise the confederate flag, raise any type of farm animals, or even drink budweiser. I'm a college graduate, I drink beer that actually has beer flavor, and I raise the American Flag. Everybody has their own likes and dislikes and reading through this thread at some of the stupid and ignorant comments that are being made is really disappointing. It's so easy for people to sit behind their keyboards and bash things they don't like or understand. So all you folks making huge generalizations about NASCAR fans can pucker up and kiss my tail pipes.
In a perfect world, NASCAR having a huge fan base is exactly why Speed should spend LESS time covering it. There are a million places to get NASCAR news, so we want Speed to be a place to get coverage of lesser known series. Obviously that plan doesn't work when you rely on ratings to sell advertising on your channel, though. As for NASCAR, I gave it a try for a couple years now. While I didn't really enjoy it, it does have interesting aspects, but I've completely given up on it now that drivers are allowed to wreck each other.
There was a time I was a big NASCAR fan, went to a few races every year, caught the majority on TV too. But then something happened, what that is I cannot put a finger on but I started to find the racing to not be as good and I was spending more of Sunday afternoons asleep on the couch when the race was on. What really irks me about Speed these days is how they have moved away from covering racing to being an Automotive lifestyle channel. Then I see the commercials for this new show with Michael Waltrip for some American Idol type show. Give me a 1/2 hour show with a DTM recap instead, I'd be all over it.
I understand your point and I don't disagree with it at all. However, put yourself in charge of SPEED. Where are you going to spend your $$$? Are you going to spend it where it generates the most revenue? NASCAR is a marketing machine. Companies that advertise in the NASCAR world consistently see a great return on their marketing dollars. SPEED can sell more advertisement for NASCAR programming then they can for others. That is how they make their money. So, the quality of the racing isn't necessarily the key factor here.
I'd be happy if Speed did their Nascar broadcasts, and ancillary bilge before and after the races, if then they showed other forms of racing. For practical intents, they don't. Pinks, Dangerous Drives, Barrett Jackson, Bullrun. It's all sewage. I think that they are looking at the MTV business model from the 90s. MTV determined that there was better business in airing reality shows than music videos. Maybe in the short term that was true, but remember that MTV was a powerful network in the 80s, and now it's barely an afterthought. The same will be true for Speed. They're afraid that their core product (racing) does not have a wide appeal, and therefore they're trying to invent car-related reality shows. It may be that they get a better share in the short term from Pinks than they do from showing BTCC, but in the long term, it's a losing proposition. They can't compete with the big reality-tv slingin' networks at their own game. Airing a third-rate reality show against the big boys will not gain market share, and will alienate their core audience: the race fans. How do I know? I never watch it.
I know what you mean...there was a few years there in the mid-2000's that the racing was boring. Last year things got better... this year there has been some awesome racing. I've been more excited to watch races lately.
HD Theatre sounds promising shows they have a majority road racing. Would be nice if some one would cover MINI Challenge, doubt it though. I just do not like NASCAR period. I seen my first live IMSA race at Sears Point when I was in 6th grade and fell in love with it. I had a signed Al Holbert poster right next to the Lambo Countach (mandatory in the 80's) poster.