For the first time at a European Olympics, swimming finals in Paris next summer will be broadcast live on network television in the United States.
In the past, NBC has saved the most anticipated events of the day for its primetime programming. But now swimming, gymnastics, and track and field will be televised live in the morning or late afternoon since Paris is six hours ahead of New York.
“To bring the Olympics to the greatest number of people, how can we take advantage of the time zone?” NBC Olympic Production producer and president Molly Solomon said. “And so what we did when you look at six hours ahead, we’re like we can take over NBC in the daytime, and have live competition all day long, including the most popular sports, their finals in the afternoon on NBC.”
NBC will feature nine hours of weekday daytime coverage along with 11 hours on the weekends. Its streaming service, Peacock, will carry every sport and event live from July 26-Aug. 11, 2024. It will mark a dozen years since streaming first debuted at the London 2012 Olympics.
“I think this is going to be a chance for fans to engage in ways that they haven’t really been able to before, because you’re going to have all of these content options,” Peacock president Kelly Campbell said. “We’re giving people this flexibility to watch and enhance the viewing experience.”
The goal of the primetime show is to “create an amazing storytelling event” with replays, interviews, and analysis. It will be hosted by Mike Tirico, who’s also assisting with morning and weekday coverage for big finals.
NBC is looking for a ratings rebound at Paris 2024 after the postponed Tokyo 2021 Olympics attracted an average of 15.6 million primetime viewers from cable and streaming combined — a 42% decrease from the Rio 2016 Olympics. The decline in viewership meant that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had less revenue to distribute than expected, leaving World Aquatics (then FINA) with $8 million less than anticipated. Beijing 2022 brought in a combined average of just 11.4 million viewers.
Each and every sound mind would VPN to the CBC or BBC or …
Seats for the race of the century can be purchased at 525 euros a shot right now. To see the Leon crawl to victory in the 400IM, be ready to fork out 690 euros
Unless they dump Ambrose, I will watch literally any other country’s broadcast over NBC.
Start searching….Rowdy has been under contract for 2024 and 2028 for awhile
BBC, CBC, 9Now, etc. No shortage of Ambrose-free alternatives.
Most broadcasters also make the OBS (global) feeds available.
American tv is so weird. Getting up in the middle of the night was part of the fun
Honestly they should just be very embarrassed that this is the first time they are offering it live from Europe. Shameful.
in Australia we’ve been getting up at odd hours forever to watch it live.
Hmm… it does seem likely that they’ll air the entire final session at 2:30pm EST and then crop out the non-American / unexciting semis and fit it into 1-1.5h at night time :/
For those of us who want to watch prime time with loved ones who won’t want to take off from work (like we would) will be forced to chose between watching alone in the afternoon or watching in prime time but missing out on some of the action.
I’ll never forget their lead-in to the women’s 100 back in 2012. “Will Missy Franklin win her first gold? Find out, when we come back!”
Directly into a TODAY Show commercial, “We sit down with Missy Franklin to talk about her gold medal!”
I almost died.
Swimming semi and final sessions are scheduled to start 230 pm in the east coast and 1130 am west coast which isn’t too bad. Champions league soccer from Europe is broadcast on weekdays at the exact time window and some people watch it. It isn’t like 4 am like the finals session this summer from Fukuoka!
Honestly, I’d rather wake up at 4AM and get to watch it live before work than have to miss it because I’m busy at work. But I get it. Overall it’s better this way and the world doesn’t revolve around my schedule.
4 AM is perfect because I’m still awake. But I don’t watch anything live regardless of when it happens. During the Olympics I typically fall 2+ days behind. No problem at all avoiding results.
But will they broadcast the entire 800 and 1500?
Of course with the obligatory stupid ad mid race
If Katie Ledecky is swimming, or someone else becomes semi-mainstream they will drop it into the PIP box during the commercial.
Mens race I only need to see the last 25.7 seconds
To see seven men get Finked ?
Bobby better be ready to break both his AR by a couple of seconds because the competition has gotten tougher
Probably and also they would want to show Ledecky winning her fourth consecutive Olympics gold in 800 free.