diphthong

too many moving parts for this luddite. live racing is gonzo for me so i'll continue to (not) analyze the racing via the 5-10 min you tube highlights. prob better for my attention span anywhoo.

staehpj1

I agree on the too many moving parts, but not the 5-10 min you tube highlights. I really want more continuous race coverage and live coverage if possible. Replays shortly after the race are the next best thing and I can live with edited more extended highlights type coverage shortly after the race. When I can't get anything else I'll follow live text commentary of a race I am especially interested in.

VPN seems like a lot of trouble, an extra expense and complication, and lets face it, fraud or theft. I am really hesitant to go that route particularly when there is another route available. It sounds like Max is the way I will probably go (along with Peacock which I already have). It is expensive, but so is a vpn account plus getting a euro base D+ account that may be rendered unuseable if they figure out how to block it.

Chicago Al 

I'll just note that an average price for a VPN is $50/year, which is what we pay for Nord, and that covers all our devices. There are discounts and bundles from various vendors that would lower that substantially, I'm just too lazy to find them or want to change. As for fraud or theft, the most tech-savvy people I know use VPNs, to avoid their web traffic being tracked, so I don't think that's a concern, if anything it's more likely to be an improvement on online security.
I think if I can find a UK friend who'll subscribe to Discovery+ for me, we'll be the closest to having what GCN+ offered, all in once place. I really don't want to get multiple new accounts.

slcbob

I travel enough and I won't travel without a VPN. So the marginal cost is $0.

diphthong

heard. my halcyon daze of waking up at 3:30am (on the west coast) to watch big mountain stages of the grand tours and the occasional classic are over. def follow the live text of procycling.com and cycling news.com for races.
all that said, really miss the transitional parts of races/stages where you're taking in the scenery/roads and you're just amazed to be following a beautiful something that you (likely) know anything about less than 25% of the participants and even less about the region/roads.

GrainBrain

I'm pretty stoked to see others trying to figure out options here! In my opinion MAX can suck an egg so that's out, I have Peacock at least. Maybe I'll try Flobike, I like how they were showcasing gravel. I'm glad to be living in the full realization of 1980's vision of corporate dystopia.

... I liked GCN so much, it was so simple and Just Worked. To be fair I only utilized probably 1% of it's content - so many things right now take up my attention. My favorite was just streaming it in the background and quickly rewinding it if I heard the announcer call out something. So many little tidbits I'd catch that wouldn't make it into highlights. You'd see a favorite rider get a seemingly uninspired result, but then look back and see what heroics had actually occurred.

I really, really enjoyed seeing the Tour of Oman, of Rwanda, the United States NCL; of those places of questionable governance where cycling could provide a bit of soft power public eye on the day to day at 22mph.

Someone let me know where I can keep up on Spanish races, that's a real bummer not to see Basque country.

slcbob

So this seemed to work:

VPN to UK
Discovery Plus sign up, create new account
Pay with a debit card drawn on a UK bank. 6.99 GBP a month.

I doubt that last step is convenient for many, but I happened to have one laying around. The click-through did not ask for the billing address as I feared, since mine is a US address.

Even with the full cost of the VPN (which I have anyway), this comes attractively priced compared to Flo Sports. I have Peacock for other reasons but don't know if that will get me anything that Eurosport won't.

We'll see how it holds up in the TDU. I have my 10 year old laptop on the TV stand feeding HDMI 4, and a wireless mouse on the side table. A little ghetto but, hey.

diphthong

almost time for "the gauntlet." should probably have all my bloodwork done before the end of february and make any last-minute changes to the will/estate/trust. looks to be a dynamite year ahead.

p.s...hope your trippie went better than expected. had to negotiate a few speed bumps here and there but would rate the two weeks a 9/10. planning on going back to girona, costa brava and adding valencia and andorra
same time as last year. praying to have a roadie bike rental for 10 days outta girona for the duration.

staehpj1

A Cycling News article https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/how...ive-streaming/ said both the men's a women's Tour Down under would be on both FloBikes and Peacock in the US and Canada. As near as I can tell that is not the case for Peacock. At least it does not seem to be in the schedule on Peacock at the present time. Sometimes they have stuff show up in the schedule at the last minute, but the women's race begins tomorrow so I doubt that will be the case.

Edit to add that Bike Radar said the following:Maybe it will yet show up on NBC or their Peacock streaming service. Seems unlikely though.

slcbob

I have Peacock because some of the family want it (I forget why) and it is cheap. I like that for a single low price now I get what I used to pay big dollars for under the old NBC Sports Gold: cycling and often I'd opt in for rugby around 6 Nations time. But as nice as it is to hear Phil chunter on and as far as Bobke and CVdV have come, the cycling coverage is inferior to just about anything except FloBikes, which a few years ago was only tolerable when they had Ant McCrossin rambling on solo and absolutely unbearable when they had their other folks on. Has Flo changed any?

I haven't watched Eurosport in a while other than via the GCN+ wrapper, but I assume they'll be keeping the bulk of the team together.

P.S. live streaming only doesn't cut it. Need on demand or DVR with some capacity.

staehpj1

I already have Peacock and Max+. Last year I enjoyed Peacock for coverage of races that GCN+ didn't cover and the family watches other stuff on Peacock. I expect to pick up the Max sports package on March 1st when the cycling coverage is supposed to begin. In the mean time I guess i will miss live coverage for anything Peacock doesn't pick up starting with the Tour Down Under.

staehpj1

All of the sudden the men's Tour Down Under showed up in the Peacock schedule in the US. It wasn't there this morning, but is now, nothing for the women's race though. Both were supposed to be covered according to several articles I saw. I am looking forward to watching the men's race.

staehpj1

I see that Max coverage of cycle racing begins tomorrow. The add on package is free for a while if you have Max (I think until after the Giro). I am looking forward to it. I figure if it lives up to expectations I'll spring for the package when the free period ends.

slcbob

Good luck with that Max cycling coverage.

In other news, I was in Peacock last weekend to watch some 6 Nations rugby. Pleasantly surprised to see it was there. Unpleasantly surprised to see that there is no On Demand option. I tuned in an hour after one of the games had finished. It was still showing as "Live" and I was able to open up the finished broadcast then scroll back to about the 38 minute mark, no further. I guess that was all that buffered in their system. I could watch forward from that with some pause, FF, Rew. Checking back in the next day, a highlights clip had appeared but still no ability to watch On Demand. Live had long gone away.

That was very different from what I saw with TDU, which was more a traditional On Demand. We'll see how things shake out over the cycling season, and I wouldn't be surprised if whether a non-Live version is available varies across organizers. Caveat emptor.

staehpj1

Some of the races on Peacock did weird things when I got interupted when watching live. I sometimes was unable to finish watching. It would go from live to gone. I found that it would come back to being available later. Or if I was delayed enough it would just suddenly stop mid race and be gone. Sometimes if I went to a different stage of the same race I'd see a link to the missing one on demand, it was there, but not in the regular listing.

Snotrub

I found that when I watched the live broadcast on Peacock and I paused the coverage or started watching late and rewound it so I could watch from the beginning, the program would shut down on me at random times. Usually at a crucial part of the stage. I learned after a while that when the live broadcast ends, so does any streaming of the event. You have to wait until they put the replay on the main menu to finish watching it.

Thanks for the input on GCN alternatives. I have Max+, so I should be able to watch the Giro. I'm planning a trip to Italy next May (yes, during the Giro) and want to see the Italian countryside to get me more excited for the trip, if that's possible.

diphthong

yeah...love access to all racing but really just here for the gt's. interesting that regardless of the sport, there seems to be a ton of confusion and a lack of continuity.
how things have changed from tuning into that ole am channel to hear a game/network to watch a game. seems like a different hoop + background check and
mother's maiden name clearance these daze to catch an event in real time. and you want that to carry over into the next season/schedule/playoffs?!?!
hahahahahhahahahahahahahahahhaha.

jsxcsnow

Has anyone in USA tried Flobikes with a VPN set to Canada ? Wondering what the service is like, and if you can get all the races that way. Seems like it would be much cheaper than a subscription to Peacock, Max and Flobikes if that works.

slcbob

Perhaps FloBikes has reformed and is not the mi$erable $uckfe$t that it was a few years ago. IDK. But if you're going to put VPN in the mix, the ONLY reason I can think of not going all in to the UK for Discovery+ / Eurosport is if you can pay Flo Canada with USD.

Let us know how it works out.

jsxcsnow

I have a friend who tried this and it's working great. Just signup for Flobikes and use a VPN. He is happy with it. Yes still a lot more than UK Discovery+/Eurosport but that isn't an option for most of us without access to a UK bank account.

Chicago Al 

I didn't realize until a few races into the season that we had Max's coverage right there for the taking, at least for the time being. What we get is the Eurosport/Disc+ coverage with Carlton or Rob along with whoever, and for certain races the 'Breakaway' team with some new additions. So that's great, except that it's not all the races, due to licensing: we got Tirreno-Adriatico, not the simultaneous Paris-Nice. I think what is going on is that NBC has the US rights for races under the Amaury umbrella.
I've struck out with any friends who might have a UK credit card adn would be willing to subscribe to Disc+ there on my behalf. So I think we'll see how Max goes, how $ it is when subscription becomes mandatory, and (sigh) maybe pony up for Peacock for the (mostly) French races. I don't have anything against Bob Roll or Christian VdV, but boy that commentary pales in comparison.

Shadco 

Peacock has the Volta a Catalunya now and its Ant Mcrossan and his linguistic gymnastics.

.

Chicago Al 

Well damn, I like McRossan, more than Carlton anyway. I may have to go for Peacock sooner rather than later, but we'll be traveling so can't watch the rest of Catalunya anyway. Thanks for the heads-up!

Shadco 

As do I but preference over Kirby isn’t saying much.

.

slcbob

I was in Max the other day and couldn't find anything cycling. Maybe user error. Maybe because I don't have the add-on package. I think there was some freebie cycling for a bit a while back. Did that go away? Or am I just imagining?

As far as commentators:

I've got a lot of patience and sympathy for Ant McCrossan. "Go sit in a box by yourself and ramble on for hours." Tough duty. Good job.

Carlton Kirby is a piece of work, for sure. Sometimes I wonder how he and Sean Kelly can be in the same team but somehow they make it work. I'm not a big fan of all of his esoteric rambling indulgences, but I admire his ability and passion for getting worked into an absolute lather in a sprint finish. Carlton and Dan Lloyd took a long pull in the middle part of MSR and weren't nearly as naughty as they have been in the past.

I can't make it through too much Rob Hatch coverage, particularly in the lowlands, without thinking of NPR's Sylvia Pojoli or the SNL Enchilada skit with Jimmy Smits.

As I type this, Landa just went off the front, Pogacar blew past him, and GC Kuss is trying to catch up. Kirby is being good.