Formula 1 race broadcasts on ESPN to remain commercial-free in United States
By Asher Fair
Formula 1 live race broadcasts on ESPN are set to remain commercial-free for fans who are watching the events in the United States.
Coverage of Formula 1 races in the United States of American made the switch from NBC Sports Network to ESPN this past offseason, with the live broadcasts of the 21 races on the 2018 Formula 1 schedule having been set to air across three different networks: ABC, ESPN and ESPN2.
It was confirmed earlier this year before the 2018 Formula 1 season started that ESPN would be teaming with Sky Sports to bring American fans the United Kingdom’s Sky Sports F1 coverage of each and every one of those 21 races throughout the year.
The Sky Sports Formula 1 broadcast team consists of commentators Martin Brundle, Anthony Davidson, Paul di Resta, Johnny Herbert and Damon Hill. It also includes expert presenters Rachel Brookes, David Croft, Ted Kravitz, Simon Lazenby and Natalie Pinkham.
The first race of the 2018 Formula 1 season was the Australian Grand Prix at the 16-turn, 5.303-kilometer (3.295-mile) Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit at Albert Park in Melbourne, Australia, and it was broadcast live on ESPN2 on Sunday, March 25th.
However, this live broadcast was met with tons of criticism, and that criticism stemmed largely from the fact that there were several commercial breaks throughout the 58-lap race that interrupted the broadcasts despite the fact that Sky Sports F1 do not stop their coverage for commercial breaks throughout their broadcasts.
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As a result of this criticism, ESPN ran a commercial-free race broadcast in the Bahrain Grand Prix, which took place this past Sunday at the 15-turn, 5.412-kilometer (3.363-mile) Bahrain International Circuit in Sakhir, Bahrain. The race was broadcast live on ESPN2.
Now, ESPN have confirmed that they will continue offer commercial-free broadcasts of Formula 1 races throughout the 2018 season after the Bahrain Grand Prix reportedly attracted 682,914 viewers from the United States, which is the largest United States cable audience for a Formula race broadcast since the 2012 United States Grand Prix, which was broadcast on SPEED Channel.
Here is what ESPN executive vice president of programming & scheduling Burke Magnus had to say about continuing to offer commercial-free broadcast of Formula 1 races throughout the 2018 season, according to Motorsport.com.
"“We intend to present the F1 races in this way for the balance of the 2018 season. F1 fans are passionate and we listened to a lot of feedback from them – the fans are very informed and the feedback we received was both polite and constructive. It helped us. We don’t have a completely finished product but we’re very happy with the way the changes after Australia were received. We’ll continue to keep working to make it better for the fans.”"
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Are you excited to know that the live broadcasts of each and every one of the remaining 19 races on the 2018 Formula 1 schedule are set to be commercial-free, uninterrupted broadcasts shown on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2?