Future of sailing: we need a Murray Walker

They should have that Irish (commedian) Commentating with his "racing gong has sounded" from the laser over dubbing which went viral last year...... that would have spiced it up....

Originally posted by ohFFsake I think the single best thing they did in the AC coverage was overlaying grid lines showing their relative progress against the wind. At a glance you could see where the boats really were in relation to one another, whether they were likely to cross at the next tack etc.

Edited by DFF - 30 Sep 13 at 11:11am

As this is the dinghy bit of the forum, I'm not so sure we need a "Murray Walker", or a Rob Walker, come to that.  The AC's on screen overlay graphics were great in terms of understanding the effects of tide and breeze, even the <dodgy> wing wash speckles were at least a 'good effort'.  Commentary was great. In fact, my only criticsm is that the sailors, in their post race interviews, were not pushed on the sailing differences or tactics that they felt had won them the race.  OK, sometimes it was a simple case of "the other guy screwed up" (in so many words) but other times, that would have been quite revealing.

Problem with dinghy racing is that theres' usually more than 2 boats.  Overlay graphics are going to get quickly 'busy' rather than helping they could well confuse.  Having said that, I do think a combo of the kind of coverage the beeb managed during the Olympics, with a overlay pen ala Gary on Sky Sports Footy coverage post-race, say in the hands of Andy Green... that might be quite interesting angle.

To complement the great imagery / computer overlay of the AC we also need to improve the quality of the commentary. The AC commentary didn't make me wince but we surely can do a whole lot better - especially for the UK market.