Today it was announced that Formula 1 (a sport I’ve loved since I was a kid) will now have half the season exclusively shown live on Sky Sports, which is a “pay to view” service, as opposed to BBC’s free offering. BBC’s coverage has been huge for the BBC, but also has been huge for fans as the coverage provided by the BBC has been phenomenal. This is especially glaring following years of ITV coverage which was marred by having adverts in between segments of the live race. Interrupting exciting moments so we can hear about shaving foam was an irritant on a level people simply didn’t want to endure, but had to.

Putting the sport on Sky is a step in the wrong direction. Bernie Ecclestone made his decision based on finance. In a global recession, a sport as expensive to run as F1 needs money. This is understandable, but alienating your audience first is horrid. This, remember, is coming in the wake of the Murdock scandal with News of the World. The Murdock empire controlling F1 coverage is bad news.

The argument was made by Alan Parr (Williams F1) that premier league fans have gotten used to Sky Sports subscriptions and have been able to support their clubs through the premium subscription model fine. However, this is fine in a sport like soccer which will always trounce motorsport in viewing figures. Putting football on Sky is fine as long as it’s premier league. This is a specific fringe division of football, that only those specific fans will desire TV coverage. It would be nice to have it open and free to air on other stations, of course.

However, using football as the rule of thumb, the major “super league” (the champions league) is on terrestrial TV – capturing the largest audience with the most advertising. Of course the comparison falls down on advertising. The BBC can’t do advertising as part of their agreement because they get public funding from TV license payers. However, if F1 were to force adverts into live races they could perhaps get around this issue. Though I wouldn’t claim to be an expert on this matter.

What I’m getting at is that F1 is the top tier of motorsport. Giving motorsport’s equivalent of the Champions League to a pay-to-view service like Sky (which is morally ambiguous to begin with thanks to Murdock’s empire) is unfair on the fans. Giving Sky more fringe motorsport events makes sense, even to “test” them out. TOCA Touring Cars, A1 league etc. would all work better on Sky. More money would go into developing drivers and teams there, where they can then graduate to F1 later on. Unfortunately Bernie and co. aren’t thinking of that. They need money, and instead of thinking up creative ways to help the sport, they’re simply trying to generate a quick fix which may actually hinder the sport in the long run because fans are unlikely (in my opinion) to flock to Sky to watch F1.