F1 Anchormen

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Alextrax52
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F1 Anchormen

Post by Alextrax52 »

I'm sure we all have a basic understanding of the history of F1 broadcasters in our respective countries but i want to ask what were/are your opinions on the men presenting?

I watch a lot of races from the past particularly around the time I first started watching F1 in the early 2000's. Back then we had ITV coverage for free albeit ridden with adverts. We had Jim Rosenthal and Steve Rider at various points. Because of my very tender age I don't remember either sticking out as terrible at the time. But I understand that Rosenthal wasn't really a die hard fan and of course Rider is clouded by the Lewis Hamilton years in particular. At least he had pure interest in racing having been in the BTCC coverage for 30 years.

In the sky era Simon Lazenby has been the host ever since the start in 2012. I've never really liked him, he comes across as fairly bland and I don't think he was helped by having limited knowledge in the beginning.

I could be chatting a load of rubbish about all this (F1 TV Coverage isn't exactly my strongest era of the sport). What are the presenters like around the world and do you warm to them or not
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WaffleCat
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by WaffleCat »

Here in Singapore, I grew up on Steve Slater and (originally) McLaren test driver Chris Goodwin. Slater was an amazing commentator, though he did have the occasional habit of mixing up drivers. His "The five red lights illuminate, and when they go out, the [X] Grand Prix is GO!" still kinda give me chills even now.

When Goodwin went away on his McLaren duties, we had a whole host of co-commentators, from the amazing Karun Chandhok to the quiet Alex Yoong to the...unintelligible…Julian Bailey. Like, his Brummie accent was thicker than a bulletproof wall. Unfortunately, by 2014 or so, they reverted to the Sky commentary, which I… actually think is inferior to Slater and co.

As for hosts, the main hosts' name is Paula Malai Ali, who's been quite the mainstay in the studio. Just…average, I reckon. Her pundits, though, have been Porsche Asia Cup driver Matthew Marsh, who is okay, and the legend, the holy, the wonderful Alex Yoong. As terrible as he was a driver, he is a truly amazing pundit. He's the kind of guy that can make my mum, completely clueless on F1, understand what is going on.

Plus, he's grown quite the sexy beard.
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dinizintheoven
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by dinizintheoven »

My very cheap satellite setup to pick up European TV is still working just fine, and there are some occasions when Channel 4 aren't showing the Grand Prix live and Five Live (or Sports Extra) aren't giving us live commentary, usually when there's a host of other sports on over the summer. Sometimes the commentary is on Five Live Online, but it matters little whether that's coming through the internet or the radio (because mine has a station reserved for that, or at least it did) but that's so far out of sync with the pictures that it makes little sense und ich muß das Geschoss beißen und den Kommentar auf Deutsch hören.

Remember the shock and horror in the 1980s because - gasp! - Christian Danner wore an earring? Won't someone please think of the children? Must have been a nano-storm in a thimble because I've often wondered how he can sit alongside Heiko Wasser and they can both put so little excitement into their commentary that, if it wasn't for the pictures, they could be describing some pensioners driving through the countryside in Nissan Micras. Murray Walker was known to say that the commentator's job is to convey his enthusiasm for the sport on top of describing the action, and if Toshihiro Suzuki, our favourite excitable Japanese commentator, takes that to the extreme, then the RTL commentators have gone off the deep end in the other direction.

As for Kai Ebel, I would comment on his fashion sense, but it's not as if David Coulthard and Eddie Jordan aren't both trying to take him on in the "who can give Trinny and Susannah a massive coronary" stakes.
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Rob Dylan
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by Rob Dylan »

Born and raised in the UK. I was too young to remember Murray Walker but I definitely remember James Allen and most of the pundits they had on. One person I quite liked because he was pretty neutral and seemed like a nice guy, was Mark Blundell. Obviously his English was of an incredible standard, but I was partial to the guy.

Don't have Sky, so have been watching BBC / Channel 4 since 2010. I don't mind Eddie Jordan in small doses, I don't mind Martin Brundle whenever I get access to Sky for a race or watch the older races, and even though I dislike his gushing over Hamilton, I have become used to Ben Edwards, and don't mind him so much anymore.

But David Coulthard I cannot stand. He is just far too smug for his own good, and most of his input and predictions are usually inaccurate or end up being completely incorrect. His analogies and metaphors and the like are just stupid and annoying. I don't find him endearing, I just wish he would go away.
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AndreaModa
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by AndreaModa »

I still get chills listening to clips of Murray's commentary. No-one has come close since then for me. Brundle isn't bad. Edwards' "Lights out, away we go!" is just so f***ing predictable and tedious now and the rest of his commentary just seems to be planned out to be short comments that the C4 editing team can splice up and insert into their fancy race edits and VTs each weekend. Coulthard can't explain even the most basic facets of the sport without using some McLaren-esque over-complicated language. Classic example was when he was asked to explain why the drivers pick up rubber after a race prior to qualifying in Japan as they talked about the Stroll/Vettel incident at Sepang. Having Button alongside him this weekend really highlighted why the TV channels need to keep things fresh. Jenson had some really interesting insights and explained things succinctly. Steve Jones does a decent job trying to inject a bit of humour into things but he's a bit cringe at times. I thought Jake Humphrey was good while the BBC had things. Never really had a problem with Rosenthal or Rider when ITV had the rights. I don't think there was ever really an issue with their coverage when Hamilton came through. He was hot property and doing really well. It's not like they were trying to blow sunshine up the arse of a Jolyon Palmer or Di Resta.

Bit of a rambling mess that.
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Faustus
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by Faustus »

In Portugal, I grew up with Jose Miguel Barros, Paulo Solipa and occasionally Domingos Piedade.
Jose Miguel Barros was very knowledgeable, as he was an accredited F1 reporter and was the editor-in-chief of a Portuguese motorsport newspaper (Autosport, the Portuguese one, not the obvious one).
Solipa was and is a moron, fawning over Senna and making idiotic comments. My father really couldn't stand him.
Domingos Piedade was great. As you'd expect from the former team manager of Copersucar, manager of Emerson Fittipaldi and former sporting director of AMG.
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Miguel98
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by Miguel98 »

Faustus wrote:In Portugal, I grew up with Jose Miguel Barros, Paulo Solipa and occasionally Domingos Piedade.
Jose Miguel Barros was very knowledgeable, as he was an accredited F1 reporter and was the editor-in-chief of a Portuguese motorsport newspaper (Autosport, the Portuguese one, not the obvious one).
Solipa was and is a moron, fawning over Senna and making idiotic comments. My father really couldn't stand him.
Domingos Piedade was great. As you'd expect from the former team manager of Copersucar, manager of Emerson Fittipaldi and former sporting director of AMG.


Everytime Domingos Piedade comes over to the Eurosport boot (especially for Le Mans), it's a pleasure. The man has so many stories, and he's an incredible talker. João Carlos Costa and Pedro Nascimento were a great team in Eurosport last year - they brought great intel into the commentary, made some jokes and overall just got the viewer busy and commited. Filipe Albuquerque is a great commentator too - reminds me a lot of Davide Valsecchi and had some very good stories as well.
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Re: F1 Anchormen

Post by Nuppiz »

Matti Kyllönen was kind of our version of Murray Walker, just turbocharged. Very enthusiastic to the point of being a nuisance to listen, often making silly mistakes, and of course being more interested on how the Finns were doing rather than the overall race. At the time he commentated I was still a kid, so his style worked for someone who also pretty much just cared about how the Mikas were doing, but in retrospect he wasn't very good.

Co-commentator Erkki Mustakari was an old warhorse with experience from hundreds of GPs. He was rather calm all of the time no matter what happened, and his insight from the sport going back 20-30 years provided a nice additional touch to the commentating, especially if the race itself wasn't very interesting.

I don't actually recall much from Tomi Tuominen (who followed Kyllönen). I guess... he did an OK job when he was the main commentator. After a few years of not being featured in the coverage, he's now a studio pundit and does a decent, if at times slightly uninspiring job there.

Oskari Saari was very good. Enthusiastic, but not to the point of annoyance. Fairly knowledgeable about the sport as well. He also didn't go over-nationalistic at any time. Overall a very balanced commentator.

Mika Salo and JJ Lehto are/were both typical ex-driver co-commentators. Nothing flashy, just doing their jobs and giving insight about how various situations actually feel to the drivers themselves.

Current main commentator Niki Juusela moved from YLE at the start of this year, and initially I had my doubts as Juusela was mainly known for commentating on ice hockey, athletics and football, but not motorsports (as YLE doesn't even show much of it). However, he's proven to be a worthy successor to Saari in terms of general tone and knowledgeability of the sport, although at times he approaches Kyllönen in his preference towards Finns. Also, it may be more of a personal preference but especially later in this season he's been a bit too impressed about Hamilton's performances.

Toni Vilander is the current co-commentator, and while he's never driven in F1 (thus lacking the insight of Lehto or Salo), he makes up with being a more pleasant person to listen on air.

Ossi Oikarinen, ex-engineer for Arrows, Toyota, BMW Sauber and Ferrari, is the second co-commentator and expert on technical affairs, who most notably can actually translate much of the code language used on team radios into something common people can understand. His output is a bit dry, but that is pretty much to be expected from his current role.
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