TV and Truck Racing

14. October 2010Time and again we are asked about TV reports on the FIA European Truck Racing Championship. We were never given any validated, official information, neither in the past nor at this moment, and we always referred to the programme previews of Sport1 (formerly DSF) and MotorsTV, because those 2 channels have been airing the race reports produced by Kamiono TV in the past two years. Sport1 is accessible free of charge via Astra; in Germany MotorsTV is only provided by several regional cable network operators since the undisputed marked leader “Kabel Deutschland” – with their almost nationwide market presence – does no longer provide MotorsTV. Although, compared to other European countries, in Germany there are by far the biggest number of cable TV households – about 20 million – the digitization rate is only slightly more than 30 per cent. Because of the predominant number of analogous connections the amount of TV channels is usually limited to around 30, and these allocations are fiercely fought over.
According to a survey by “Satelliten Monitor” in Germany the proportion of households with cable TV is 50 per cent; 43 per cent have got satellite television. Only 5 per cent use terrestrial TV and 2 per cent watch IPTV. However, the overall European survey looks quite different; a majority of 35 per cent watches terrestrial TV, followed by satellite TV (32 per cent), cable TV (29 per cent) and IPTV (4 per cent). This means that most probably there are quite a lot of TV channels all over Europe that report about truck racing; but unfortunately we do not know any details.
After our “This and That” report about the final round in Jarama we received two less than friendly emails, accusing us of principally ignoring truck racing reports on TV, as allegedly once again we failed to indicate that on October 9, at 9:45 a.m., a truck racing report was going to be aired on TV.
We answered both emails, but both answers were returned with the note “undeliverable”, those were obviously faulty email addresses.
Actually, the information available in this matter was more than confusing. In the pertinent TV programme guides (magazines) it said: Sport1: October 9th, 10:45 a.m. – Truck Racing FIA ETRC. On the Kamiono website it was explicitly pointed out that the Sport1 report was postponed; in the TV programme listed on the Sport1 website the truck racing report wasn’t even mentioned. According to their schedule at 9:45 a.m. there was a live broadcast of the MotoGP and at 10:45 a.m. a report about the German Forklift Drivers’ Cup. That was exactly the problem, as mentioned above – no clear statements about truck racing reports on Sport1. And our WebPortal never got any sort of information regarding that matter.
By the way, last Sunday after the report on the MotoGP Sport1 aired the Forklift Drivers Championship.
Meanwhile there is a new broadcast date for the truck racing final in Jarama which is in conformity with all parties involved – Sport1 as well as Kamiono TV and in all TV programme guides – Saturday, October 16th, 9:45 – 10:15 a.m.