SIS LIVE was at Holyrood Park in Edinburgh to provide OB and uplink services for a series of international cross country races featuring some of the world’s top athletes On the 7th January.
The 90min broadcast featured three live races and highlights of two more, and aired on BBC 2 in Scotland and BBC 1 in the rest of the UK. The programme included coverage of the Junior Men’s and Junior Women’s 6km races, the Men’s International 4.2km and 9km races and the Women’s International 5.8km. Commentary was provided by Steve Cram and Brendan Foster with Jonathan Edwards presenting.
After last year’s slippery snow covered course, this year saw warmer temperatures and wet ground, slowing the runners down somewhat. The shock of the day occurred when double Olympic champion and odds on favourite Kenenisa Bekele finished 11th in the international men’s event. This exciting race was, without question, the highlight of the day, and saw the Kenyan Asbel Kiprop finish in first place, just five seconds ahead of the elated Briton Jonny Hay. An exciting Team International Match was also staged with the Great Britain and Northern Ireland team seeing off stiff competition from the United States and Europe Select side.
The events were captured by 8 cameras placed around the track, including a 34m hydraulic hoist which gave swooping aerial views, and a 4 wheel buggy with radio linked steadicam tracking the action around the course.
The Final Cut Pro edit suite aboard OB Unit 10 was used on Friday and Saturday morning to cut together pre-recorded interviews with the athletes. These were then loaded into the EVS and inserted into the main programme. The EVS was also used to record, edit and play in the pre-recorded races and for slo-mo coverage of the live race finishes.
SIS LIVE also provided uplink services to BBC Television Centre through their SIS 60 SNG vehicle as well as wireless connectivity for the RF linked buggy.
So, as the sun sets over the picturesque Edinburgh, all that remains is for SIS LIVE’s VT editor to backup the footage onto hard drive and digibeta and send it safely to the BBC archives for future use, despite the protestations of a certain disappointed Olympic Champion.