Noooo! Rain sucks gimme my AToC!!!!

Grrr! I came home from the barn earlier than planned because I thought I was missing the race streaming on my comp but nooooo! I have never given a rat's hind end about watching sports but after the prologue I am hooked. I yell, I scream, I console Tyler when he appears to be suf-fer-ing. Why? Why? Oh tell me there's a sports bar with Versus on and WiFi around here. ARGH!!! This is probably how the Arizona Comcast customers felt when they got porn instead of the superbowl. No, they might have enjoyed that. I'm gonna go cry now. :(

I've heard the weather has been interfering with the race broadcast (the planes that beam the signals back to the studios either cannot fly or cannot receive the signals from the camera - it happened with one of the spring classics in deep fog once too)

But on the good side- VS decided to air some of the women's crit, so long as the men's race wasn't coming through!

I'm hooked too - it's going to be a great week of racing. Versus finally got the video feed going so at least we saw the end of the stage. The prologue yesterday got the whole thing started - and it motivated me to be out on my my bike this morning, despite some chilly winds.

I am an avid Pro Cycling watcher and am super bummed not to be in Cali this year so was even more bummed not to have coverage yesterday. :( I was glad Mancebo won even though I am not a Rock Racing fan, he earned it and I was rooting for him. Doubt he will have much in the tank to keep the yellow but he deserved that stage.

And VS needs to send Craig Hummer away, he is interferring with my Phil & Paul time. :p

Oh great, more rain today. So far the video is going, let's hope it stays that way. I don't want to listen to another awful Bob Roll interview. Also, can they PLEASE stop playing that horrid song when replaying shots from the race! That screeching guitar-type thing just cuts right through me, and once I notice it, it's all I can hear.

I am going to stay out of the thread soon, I have the DVR going but the funniest thing was yesterday... Hummer babbling something about being happy to be warm in the booth (which he said 5 minutes earlier) and Phil and Paul staring at him blankly. It was really awkward! I am not sure if they didn't hear him or were annoyed that he was repeating himself, but if there were crickets you would have heard them. :p

They heard him. I think he misread the teleprompter.

I'm okay with Craig. He is light years better than Al Trautwig.

Hands down better than Trautwig who annoyed me pretending to know gymnastics and every other sport at the Olympics! Although as an aside Trautwig trying to commentate on the trampoline gymnastics was pee in your pants funny.

But I pretty much thought Hummer was usually when he showed up unable to pronounce my favorite Hincapie's name last year. By the end of the tour I think someone set him straight it was really bad! He is alright, just needs to be heard much less and I am happy. I listen for Phil and Paul! :p

I don't know why VS feels the need to put an American voice, and usually an ignorant one at that, with Phil and Paul. Phil and Paul are all we need.:)

I would like to know what they were smoking when they decided to start yesterday's coverage at 9:00 PST, so early in the stage that the riders were still in the neutral zone, and expected the stage to be finished three hours later. I set the DVR to record a 1/2 hour past the scheduled end time and I still missed the entire last climb and the finish, AKA the important part of the race.

I now have the DVR set to go a full hour over the scheduled times. And I would like to thank the developers who programmed the DVR software, because all I had to do was change the stop time for today, and it automatically reset the recording time for every other stage. Very impressive technology which will make my life so much easier when it comes time to record Phil and Paul's live coverage of the TdF.

We set the live to go over but I told DH at about as they were about to hit the last climb, this is going to go over big time! Luckily when we set it to get the 10:00 (cst) recap and got the finish. Today he set it way over.

And yes, the Golden Gate being closed was impressive but really you could have recaped that VS!

Yep, just as it was getting to the good part yesterday my DVR recording was done. We reset it for the 10 pm recap and I stayed up late to watch the end. I also reset all the upcoming recordings to go 1 hour over. Harumph!

I was furious that they cut off the end of yesterday's stage for the hockey game. Sorry, I don't have home internet, so broadcasting it there doesn't help me. Everything was lining up, they were a few miles from town, things were about to happen. Then - sorry, we have to cut it off to put on a meaningless late-season game with two teams with no playoff hopes. No other sports network does that. The beginning of games are always held off until whatever was on finishes. I thought it was very disrespectful, as if it doesn't count as a "real" sport so just shove it aside. Bad move, VS.

NoNo- Even worse I had to listen to a husband whining like a baby about it and again this morning! He didn't set for 10:00 (did for 1:00). I had a raging headache so I had been peacefully sleeping for sometime whining boy wasn't helping me. BOOOO VS!!! And two native Texans really couldn't care about Hockey, we at least can be sucked into watching bull riding but I don't get hockey. :p

Count me in the furious club! That blew! And, I fell asleep right before the end of the rebroadcast last night (missing the finish), woke up at 12:10am, and couldn't sleep all night.

I tried to get coverage on the computer through Versus and because of over 100,000 viewers I could not get coverage.

I also thought the same, had this been any other sport, the following shows would have aired after the race ended. Had it been a playoff game or Stanley Cup, maybe I could see, but a regular game, give me a break!!!

Don't get me wrong, I love hockey as my son played travel hockey for 7 years. However, at times there are priorities and Versus did the sport of cycling a huge injustice, imho.

~ JoAnn

And I just looked who won. :D I will have to watch the recap anyway! I am not posting in case some of you will watch a late night recording but I like the winner.

Maybe one of the more eloquent ladies of TE could write up an angry letter we can all sign and send to VS. I doubt it would affect any future programming decisions, but we could make our feelings known.

Count me in the furious group. I love hockey, but cutting off the end of the race to show the early part of a meaningless hockey game is beyond idiotic. Think they would cut off the last 2 minutes of a close football game? The last inning of a close baseball game? The 18th hole in a golf tournement? Versus has a "feedback" link on their website which I am using to tell them what I think of their stupidity. I urge everyone who is equally p.o'd to do the same.

thank you, I sent them an email.

~ JoAnn