Sky Racing

Television Subscription and International
61

Sky Racing reporter Julie Snook (ex-Nine) married actor Hugo Johnstone-Burt at Blue Mountains on Friday.
https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/entertainment/tv-reporter-julie-snook-marries-actor-hugo-johnstoneburt-in-blue-mountains/news-story/652682acbcb632d38ffa3c5efe1c565f

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62

Veteran racing journalist and presenter Adam Hamilton is leaving Sky Racing and Tabcorp.

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63

Any chance Foxtel can make Sky Racing 1 HD?

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So it turns out that the version of Sky 1 & 2 that the betting companies show is slightly different to the one for Foxtel (and I’m guessing the venues) - went to watch a race via Sportsbet and the race before was unavailable for contractual reasons, but it was on Foxtel

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65

Flemington races weren’t on Sportsbet due to Channel 10 contractural reasons

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66

I haven’t seen a race blocked on Sky’s stream for a while, but I did notice this a few years ago. I think it was for one of the provincial Melbourne meetings that was simulcast on Seven and Racing.com

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67

Just wish we could get Sky 1 in HD through a Foxtel. Surely we pay enough for Fox to get they privilege. Especially when it’s in HD at venues.

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68

I’m very surprised at the low quality offer or complete lack of Sky Racing across Foxtel’s platforms. I’d say their deals with Sportsbet, Ladbrokes, etc, have something to do with it not being part of Kayo, but the lack of Sky 1 and 2 in HD is odd. There’d be many subscribers out there that pay for Foxtel legacy just for Sky Racing.

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69

Thought Sky aren’t allowed to stream Victorian races (at least on TAB platforms) due to Racing.com having those rights?

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70

That must be the reason. Could extend to SA races too?

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71

Think that’s correct.

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73

Will be interesting to see what happens here. Racing.com broadcast the Hunter Cup harness race a few weeks ago which resulted in a significant increase in wagering turnover for the night. Would not be surprised to see Victorian Harness racing end up on racing.com down the track

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74

That certainly -was- the case at the time, Sky hadn’t done (or-redone) the deal with Racing Victoria at the time - they probably would have had the audio from RSN 927 but no video. I can’t remember if Racing.com had the deal with Thoroughbred Racing SA just then but it was about the same time.

They’ve had that deal done for a while now - but from memory, Sky are only allowed to take the 3 minutes before the scheduled race start time, and 90 seconds afterwards - that’s so the pre-race previews and post-race interviews stay exclusive to Racing.com. They blank out any interviews that spill into that time too.

I suspect it’s actually they do similar for the NSW/QLD meetings on Sky’s own Thoroughbred Central channel - but for totally different business reasons; ie. it makes sure Sky 1 is a pure “racing to bet on every 3 minutes!!” channel, for better or worse.

I’m pretty sure they’re allowed to show the full Sky 1/2 stream including such races on the TAB site, although I don’t know access to VIC/SA gallops extends to the feed that they now offer to other betting companies.

Not totally surprised by this, or that they’ll want something similar to the Racing Victoria deal - at the very least, it’s leverage to be used on Sky, though I can’t imagine the dollars behind it to be that huge in dogs or especially harness.

The Victorian harness/dogs codes have been rather bullish with setting up their online streaming brands. If they see a better life aligned with the Racing Victoria IMB model and do a deal with Sky on a similar basis, they’re probably best placed to do it.

How you’d balance the non-gallops racing with the “racing purist” offering on channel 78, I don’t know - maybe the minor codes remain streaming only but Racing.com shows the big events, like the aforementioned Hunter Cup.

The VIC dogs in particular know that Sky will likely come begging for some non-exclusive deal, since so much of Sky’s “wall-to-wall” racing expansion that Sky 1’s become known for in the past 15-20 years, came from afternoon and twilight greyhounds, especially from Victoria. (Though the article suggests they can threaten them with dropping them to Sky 2… I dunno how they could sustain that though.)

The NSW dogs deal they speak about (with Tabcorp’s US arm in Sky Racing World)… I suspect their gripe with their US situation is because Tabcorp tends to feed race meetings to the US that are the early afternoon slot in Australia, to be prime time over there, mixed in with the gallops… a slot NSW don’t use a lot compared to VIC/QLD/SA. Tabcorp are not going to feed, say, a Wentworth Park meeting that’s on at 4am in the US. So I guess they’re thinking Asia is an opportunity, but they’d need to get out of the Sky deal to do so.

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75
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An ad on the ABC?

No one truly believes they are doing it because they want to “help rural racing” do they? It’s purely because they’ve realised its more content to show, more the addicts will bet on, and the more money they’ll make.

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77

Maybe. It could also be said that if it wasn’t for the content and the resulting profits the industry would be dead. I frequent rural race meetings in WA. It’s a festival that usually lasts a couple of days and the local economy benefits greatly. If Sky can build an audience then jockeys, trainers, officials and punters will all benefit.

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78

And their bottom line.

:joy: :joy: :joy: The house always wins.

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I don’t doubt that.

80

Another year’s gone by. Spring is here. And you still can’t get Sky Racing 1 in HD at home on Foxtel. Why?

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