zzdcar
Home
/
Reviews
/
Racing
/
Rejoice, for ESPN Will Do Commercial-Free F1 Races Again This Season
Rejoice, for ESPN Will Do Commercial-Free F1 Races Again This Season-October 2024
2024-02-19 EST 22:11:11

When said it would show the rest of the 2018 season without commercials after its in the U.S. last year, it seemed too good to be true. Surely, it was just a way to apologize, and wouldn’t carry over into 2019. Surely, we were getting spoiled to a temporary thing.

Well, we were all wrong. Once again, ESPN will broadcast this F1 season in the U.S. without commercials. reported the news earlier this week, and a spokesperson for ESPN confirmed it to Jalopnik on Friday.

This is when we all do a goofy celebratory handshake that someone will manage to screw up two moves in, because, for yet another year, we won’t have to miss a second of or the whole season.

The almost necessary move to commercial-free coverage in 2018 came one race into ESPN’s new reign as America’s F1 broadcaster. The network before the 2018 season and the series moved there from NBC, which, at the time, had the rights since 2013. Rather than doing its own broadcast like NBC did, ESPN decided to pay for the rights to .

It sounded easy enough, until it wasn’t.

See, Sky Sports gives its European viewers commercial-free F1 broadcasts. Given that this is America and everything is an ad, ESPN wasn’t going that route.

That led to of the Australian Grand Prix in the U.S., because ESPN tried to force commercial breaks into a broadcast that didn’t break for commercials. ESPN cut out during key moments in the race, and even breaks during less eventful times were unnatural, because the U.S. version of the broadcast was going to commercial while Sky Sports’ commentators were in full swing.

ESPN apologized for it all, and later announced that the rest of the season would go commercial free. It was a good way to try to keep viewers around, especially with the launching soon.

Usually, though, things like this are short lived—a band-aid to make everyone happy until they’ve forgotten about how mad they were. It was only natural to assume that someone at ESPN would figure out how to make commercial breaks seem more natural during Sky Sports’ commercial-free coverage, and that the ads would resume after the 2018 season ended.

But ESPN didn’t do that. We’re going another year without any commercials during F1 in the U.S., and that’s cool.

Now, if only the stewards would call a few more safety cars during the races. Some of us have to go to the bathroom from time to time.

Comments
Welcome to zzdcar comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Racing
Max Verstappen's Biggest Problem Is That The Problem Is Never The Same
Max Verstappen's Biggest Problem Is That The Problem Is Never The Same
Red Bull Formula One driver Max Verstappen has had horrifyingly bad luck this year, having finished only half of his races this season. His last retirement was in to his home race, to boot. But perhaps the most frustrating thing about it is that it’s always something different that seems...
Oct 21, 2024
Spend Your Labor Day Weekend Watching A Full Schedule Of Racing
Spend Your Labor Day Weekend Watching A Full Schedule Of Racing
Welcome to the Jalopnik , where we let you know what’s going on in the world of racing, where you can see it, and where you can talk about it all in one convenient place. Where else would you want to spend your weekend? Oh boy, is there a lot...
Oct 21, 2024
Lewis Hamilton Bests Michael Schumacher With 69th F1 Pole Position, Nice
Lewis Hamilton Bests Michael Schumacher With 69th F1 Pole Position, Nice
Lewis Hamilton has broken a record with his 69th pole position following today’s qualifying for the Italian Grand Prix. Nice. Hamilton’s 69th pole position edges out Michael Schumacher as the all-time pole leader, which is a monumental achievement. 69 - I can’t believe it. ...
Oct 21, 2024
Here's Your Epic Gallery Of Pirelli World Challenge Cooking At COTA
Here's Your Epic Gallery Of Pirelli World Challenge Cooking At COTA
While many parts of Texas are still dealing with the effects of Hurricane Harvey, Austin has dried up, and is back to its usual miserable heat and humidity. As conditions and the forecast cleared, Circuit of The Americas and Pirelli World Challenge agreed to go forward with this weekend’s plans...
Oct 21, 2024
Nine Cars Of F1's 20-Car Field Racked Up 150 Places' Worth Of Grid Penalties At Monza
Nine Cars Of F1's 20-Car Field Racked Up 150 Places' Worth Of Grid Penalties At Monza
“I don’t even know what the grid is and I’m here to explain this to people,” Sky Sports’ Martin Brundle explained this morning during his pre-F1 race grid walk. When there are so many penalties that nearly the entire half of the grid is affected, you know there’s . The...
Oct 21, 2024
The 24 Hours Of Le Mans Is Now The Season Closer Amid Huge WEC Changes
The 24 Hours Of Le Mans Is Now The Season Closer Amid Huge WEC Changes
Now that Porsche plans to leave the World Endurance Championship’s top LMP1 class at the end of this year, the future of the WEC is in question. Now the WEC is making drastic changes in hopes of staying relevant, including flipping the schedule to end with Le Mans, returning to...
Oct 21, 2024
Copyright 2023-2024 - www.zzdcar.com All Rights Reserved