Sports News

How odd is it that HBO covered the Chili Bowl, but not ESPN or Speed?

This is a disappointing display from ESPN and SPEED. These guys are supposed to be covering auto racing, but HBO steps in and televises the race. Yeah, it was pay per view, but at least it got covered. Maybe next year it will get normal network coverage.

Public Comments

1. HBO is trying to get into the auto racing scene by any means necessary. If you remember they also did the Pay Per View for the Prelude to a Dream at eldora. I purchased both of these events and was pleasantly surprised and how good the coverage was. I would like to see events like the "Dream" being offered in the future. As for why the "racing" channels didn't carry the event all i can think of is that type of racing has its own fan base (even though alot of different series were represented) and the other networks may not have wanted to take the risk w/o knowing what the reward might have been. I think HBO is heading in the right direction with its pay per view events it chose for racing this year and in the future.
2. Disappointing yes, surprising no. Speed and ESPN are only into big time racing LIVE. If the Chili Bowl was a success on pay for view, it unfortunately will never offered any other way. They tried the pay for view route with the Pocono 500 NASCAR race a few years ago. It didn't get good ratings and ESPN picked the race up again the next season.
3. Money talks, B.S. takes the bus home.
4. Its not Odd there just wasnt enough money for the Espn or Speed channels to make off of it!!!! Good Coverage doesnt matter anymore Its all about the Money!!!!
5. as racing fans know the chili bowl is a huge winter event, i was there many years ago, its great its on the tv even if its pay per view, maybe someone new has been exposed to dirt track racing and will realize there is more than asscar, i see its being rerun too, speed and espn2 missed the boat but maybe that will change in the future, live racing has faded on the tv except for indy and asscar, remember thursday night thunder, how about the live outlaw shows, anything on the tv is good no matter whos carrying it!
6. I don't think it is that odd if you think about the pay per view end of it. Back in the day ESPN would have done it and did do it years ago and I seem to remember maybe speed showed replays of it. Lets face it Speed sucks so bad any more I am surprised they don't show some soup opera that has a car in it. The only time they show racing is during the day when we are working and if you are lucky that you don't have something planed you might get to catch a race on the weekend. That being said though I am truly happy that they showed the V8 supercars this year. What a great series. Hope they keep it there and away from our American warped corporate minds. It would be a true shame if they got a hold of it and screw it up like they did NA$CAR.
7. It isn't odd. Dirt track racing is generally a sport that needs all the money that it can get, so if HBO can get 50 million people watching and zing'em 20 bucks each, that's a lot of money that ESPN doesn't have. And also, Speed will probably rerun it eventually, like they do with the Prelude and the Summer Shootout Series