OK. There's no Lance and no Landis, but we still have Levi for this year's Tour de France bicycle race.
Even so, broadcast media watcher MediaDailyNews says the Versus cable network is in for a “rough ride” with this year's Tour de France broadcast ratings, what with no clear American favorite and the doping scandals that are ripping apart cycling.
Versus has scheduled 17 hours of daily Tour de France coverage from the July 7th prologue in London to the July 29th finish in Paris. The usual suspects will be behind the microphones: Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen are returning as the main commentators, and Bob “Tour Day France” Roll and Al Trautwig will host the extended prime-time replay.
Cycling experts Frankie Andreu (who interestingly has admitted to doping in his career), Craig Hummer and Robbie Ventura will report from the field.
In spite of its dire predictions for viewership, MediaDailyNews says sponsorships and early season cycling viewers have remained steady. Unless you Tivo, you'll see commercials from Anheuser-Busch, Saab, Hampton Inn, Bridgestone and Yamaha, as well as bike makers Cervelo and Specialized.
And the viewership for the Cyclysm Sunday broadcasts of the early races and spring classics has held steady this year, Versus president Gavin Harvey, is quoted in MediaDailyNews.
Holding steady is about as good as Versus can hope for, unless Discovery Channel pro cycling team captain Levi Leipheimer jumps to the front and hangs on for the yellow jersey.
Even so, he doesn't have following of someone like Lance Armstrong, won multiple Tours de France after a highly publicized battle against cancer.
Viewership numbers in the New York Times show an increase until 2005, then a sudden drop: 2002 — 449,000; 2003 — 1,169,000; 2004 — 1,465,000; 2005 — 1,743,000; 2006 — 892,000.
I found it interesting that in spite of Armstrong not racing in 2006, there was enough residual interest to boost levels to twice that of 2002.
Let's just hope there are enough viewers this year to convice Versus to continue broadcasting the race into the future.
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