SailGP: Time to upgrade the coverage

The fifth season of SailGP Gets underway November 23-24 and Al Posnack has a suggestion on how to make the broadcast more interesting:

Full disclosure: I’m hooked on SailGP. I love the concept. I love the technology. I love the speed. I love the short-course format. I love all the excitement it brings. And as every regatta approaches, I can’t wait to watch!

The TV coverage – not so much.

Sadly, the very things that make SailGP exciting – the high speed and the close action – make it all but impossible to cover on live TV. The good stuff – and some of it is really good – flashes by at subliminal speed. The action is too fast, and the critical moments are too brief.

SailGP has everything needed to provide real excitement for an audience of racers and newbies as well. They are at the very leading edge of technology, yet their coverage is mired in the last century. It doesn’t have to be that way. Here’s my two cents. Maybe three.

While watching an aerial view of an exciting start, followed by a bunch of boats going 30 or 40 knots, the moment at the first mark will define the rest of the race. Will the inside boat get there in time? Will the outside boat roll the fleet at the mark? What could be more exciting? What could be more important to the race?

The commentators are in a frenzy! And then … the coverage leaps from view to view faster than a nervous flea. You see everything yet you see nothing! You scream at the TV! Then you are given a fleeting look at the actual rounding … and then on to leg 2. Why is Canada now way back in 6th? How did Spain squirt into the lead? Too late. No time to watch all of that!

SailGP can easily bring their coverage into the current century. Do they need more cameras? No. More drones or helicopters? No. Better announcers? Certainly not.

The good stuff in sailboat racing is all about certain moments. (Starts, roundings, tactical moves, mistakes, fouls, wipeouts, etc.). And with SailGP those moments occur in a flash! For each important moment, the coverage should immediately go back and revisit it.

Replay it in slow-motion, show different views if possible, and explain exactly what took place. Then pick up the action where it left off. Hmmmm. That sounds familiar! Isn’t that what makes football coverage so great?

“But football has plenty of time between plays, and SailGP doesn’t,” you say. Correct. But why must it be that way? SailGP can MAKE time if it chooses to. Where is it written that the TV coverage must end in real time?

Forget real-time. The viewers don’t care. The typical race takes 12 to 15 minutes. Adding instant replays will add a few minutes, and the coverage will end a bit later. So what? Most of today’s TV is not live anyway; we already live in a world of replays, YouTube, on-demand streaming, and delayed streaming. The good folks at SailGP will make me really happy with these common sense changes.

What do I want to see next season when I watch SailGP? Great tactical moves. Tactical blunders. Fouls. Close action at the marks. Wipeouts! Near misses. And more. Each of those things can change an entire race. And those are the best parts. Give them to me in slo-mo replay and I will be a happy dude.

I still remember one of the great moments from last season, where Denmark follows Australia around the final mark, gets an overlap to leeward, and takes Australia up and out of the action.

Sadly, the coverage switched twice to onboard views in the middle of that brief sequence. I still would like to see a slow-motion replay of that, with an explanation of what rights Denmark had at that moment. See it here: https://www.tiktok.com/@sailgp/video/7365211686812388641

And what about all the close-ups? The grinders, the drivers, the crew bounding across the trampoline, close-ups of the foils, onboard views of the tight action. They are great views and all very important. But please, find a good place to show them. Don’t interrupt the best parts of the action to flash that stuff on my screen.

Broadcasts of high-speed sailboat races are not going away. They will only get better. The time is now for SailGP to seize the moment and leap forward!

Nuff said. Now I feel better. Sir Russell – I hope you’re listening.

Twelve Teams for Season 5
• Australia
• Brazil
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• Germany
• Great Britain
• Italy
• New Zealand*
• Spain*
• Switzerland
• United States
* League funded teams

SailGP information – YouTube – Facebook

Season 5 Schedule – 14 events
2024
November 23-24 – Dubai, UAE

2025
January 18-19 – Auckland, New Zealand
February 8-9 – Sydney, Australia
March 15-16 – Los Angeles, USA
March 22-26 – San Francisco, USA
May 3-4 – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
June 7-8 – New York City, USA
July 19-20 – Portsmouth, Great Britain
August 16-17 – Sassnitz, Germany
September 6-7 – Taranto, Italy
September 20-21 – Geneva, Switzerland
October 4-5 – Andalucía – Cádiz, Spain
November 7-8 – Middle East *
November 29-30 – Grand Final – Abu Dhabi, UAE
* Venue to be announced

Format for Season 5:
• Teams compete in identical F50 catamarans.
• Each event runs across two days.
• Five qualifying fleet races of approximately 15 minutes may be scheduled for each regatta.
• The top three teams from qualifying advance to a final race to be crowned event champion and earn the largest share of the prize purse (amount not confirmed; Season 4 had $400,000.00 USD prize purse with winning team earning $200k at each event).
• The season ends with the Grand Final, which includes the Championship Final Race for the top three teams in the season standing with the winner claiming a monetary award (amount not confirmed; Season 4 had $2 million USD prize).
• The top team on points ahead of the three-boat Championship Final will get a monetary award (amount not confirmed; Season 4 had a $350,000.00 prize).

For competition documents, click here.

Established in 2018, SailGP seeks to be an annual, global sports league featuring fan-centric inshore racing among national teams in some of the iconic harbors around the globe.

Source: SailGP, SSN