Guest Column on the Canadian Olympic Broadcasting Consortium

I’ve been trying to watch CTV’s coverage of the Olympics and for a short time on Monday, I found a backdoor site that allowed me to watch the review of Sunday’s gold medal win by Alexandre Bilodeau and previewed Monday’s downhill before it got shut down.

That was my extent of watching the Canadian Olympic Broadcasting Consortium, but luckily, I have readers watching up the coverage north and thanks to Jason Leimer, he gave this review of the first weekend of coverage.

Friday Night was the Opening Ceremony and a familiar face to Canadians, Brian Willams was the anchor along with Lloyd Robertson who is the host of the national news on CTV and Catriona Le May Doan who later was one of the 4 Canadian athletes who light the indoor flame at BC Place. 

Overall, they did a outstanding job of keeping the talk to a minimum during the ceremonies and the part that struck me was the way that they told the stories of the torch relay from where it began, to how much it weighed for when Lloyd and Brian carried the torch. The only criticism I have was the involvement of Much Music (a Canadian TV music channel) in the Pre Show and whether it should air two girls taking body shots from of a guy which was bizarre. It was understandable to have the network there because Much Music is airing music concerts from Vancouver and Whistler.

Onto the coverage of the games, one word can describe it for me: excellent. The Consortium knows how to cover the Olympics in Canada. If you’re a ski jumping fan, you can find it on TSN. If you want to watch the Luge, it’s on CTV. If you want to watch Speed Skating, it’s on Rogers Sportsnet. Plus, if you miss a event during the day, the networks will air it again during primetime so you won’t miss a moment of the action.

The hosts so far have been excellent. Brian Williams is at the top of his game as always and he interviewed Steve Yzerman Sunday night. Brian is the Bob Costas of Canada. He remains calm on the air and he is the reassuring voice during these games. For the daytime coverage, James Duthie and Lisa LaFlemme have been o.k., but not up to A+ standards. On Rogers Sportsnet, they have done a good job with familiar pairings to Canadians such as Brad Fay and the lovely Martine Gallard. 

Also pieces on Canada’s athletes have been top notch especially one on Bryce Davidson and Jessica Dube, the Figure Skating pair who overcome great odds to be at the games.

As far as play-by-play and analysts are concerned, Jamie Campbell the TV voice of the Toronto Blue Jays has been his usual self with the call of Alexandre Bilodeau which was bleh to say the least. 

Catriona Le May Doan is very good on the speedskating coverage. She gives the viewer a sense of what is happening at the event and why some of the coaches go onto the ice during the race. 

R.J. Broadhead who anchors Sportsnet Connected has done a decent job on the ski jump and biathlon. 

Jamie Sale and David Pelletier who are the analysts on the pairs are solid. I wish Rod Black on the other hand was not calling the figure skating, but since he has called it before on TSN it’s understandable why he’s there.

Overall the Canadian Olympic Broadcasting Consortium has done a very good job in covering the Olympic Games in their own country. I give them a B+

Again thanks to Jason for writing the review.