See also: “Watching the 2008 Tour of Missouri at home or the office”
If you like watching live or same-day cycling coverage, there's a new website to check out.
A newly rebranded sports programming broadcaster is launching its free, online video-streaming cycling coverage on Friday with the Tour of Germany, followed by the Cycling Grand Prix, Doylestown Criterium, Tour of Missouri, and UCI Road World Championships.
Universal Sports, formerly WCSN, is making this foray into cycling to determine its popularity for online viewing. If it gains traction, I'm told, they plan to expand their cycling coverage with more and bigger races.
They've signed former US cyclist Frankie Andreu as one of their commentators.
Live or same day
All cycling races will be live or same-day delayed. You can tell from the schedule that, at least for the US cycling, you'll be seeing the race as it happens.
I spoke with an associate in marketing, Josh Grove, recently. He said that no subscriptions or fees are required for online viewers. “Right now, the idea is to keep it free going forward.”
Cycling is just a small part of the offerings of Universal Sports, a joint venture between NBC Sports and InterMedia Partners. Universal Sports will have access to NBC's entire archive of Olympic sports and has programming agreements with international federations that govern many sports, including cycling.
Cycling coverage kicks off at 6 a.m. (ET) Friday with the prologue of the 9-day Tour of Germany, aka Deutschland Tour. Defending champion Jens Voigt will for CSC, along with US cyclist Bobby Julich. It runs through Sept. 6. You can check the Tour of Germany prologue screen here.
The other races:
UCI Univest Cycling Grand Prix, Philadelphia, Sept. 6
Doylestown Criterium, Sept. 7
Tour of Missouri, Sept. 8 – 14
UCI Road World Championships — U23, men's and women's time trial, Sept. 23-25
UCI Road World Championships — U23, men's and women's road race, Sept. 26-28
Videoplayer
Universal Sports will be using the Jump.tv videoplayer to stream the races. Interestingly, competitor Cycling.tv is owned by Jump.tv.
I plan to stop in frequently throughout September to see how this new platform is doing, and I'll check out its Tour of Missouri coverage to follow that race closely.
This is definitely the service that cycling enthusiasts here need to keep up with their favorites. I hope it's successful and offers live and same-day coverage of the spring classics and other big races in Europe.
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