TV First For Women's Criterium

Last updated : 30 July 2015 By Penny Dain

Viewers of the Prudential RideLondon Grand Prix around London’s St James’s Park on Saturday 1 August will benefit from revolutionary sports broadcast technology being used for the first time ever at a live, outdoor cycling event.

Coverage of the world-class women’s criterium on BBC2 will include live footage from three on-bike cameras attached to the frames of the event’s biggest stars – double Olympic champion and 2013 winner Laura Trott, defending champion Giorgia Bronzini, and Sweden’s multiple national road race and time trial champion, Emma Johansson.

The TV world-first for cycling means watchers will get an unprecedented rider’s-eye view of the fast and furious action as it happens on Saturday evening when the race will be broadcast live to their living rooms by BBC Sport for one hour from 18:00.

The specially engineered, super lightweight cameras will provide forwards or backwards views of the action from the very heart of the peloton, giving viewers a close-up experience of the race as if they were among the speeding bikes themselves.

The mini cameras will transmit the High Definition pictures via a number of dedicated radio frequency nodes sited at various points around the stunning 1.3-mile circuit in central London.

“Cycling is entering a new era in broadcasting,” said Rohan Browning, managing director of Century TV, the event’s host broadcast company, which has worked with Belgian facilities provider Videohouse-Eurolinx/BRF on developing the technology.

“Lots of people have wanted to provide on-bike live coverage for years,” said Browning. “We’ve seen it successfully used in post-production as well as recently in the velodrome, but everyone wants to see it used live on the roads. The technology has always been a limiting factor, as well as battery life and weight.

“Now, thanks to Videohouse-Eurolinx/BRF, the technology is in place which allows us to bring these new techniques into cycling for the first time. It’s a brilliant development and hopefully will provide fantastic live pictures.

Hugh Brasher, Event Director of Prudential RideLondon, welcomed another first for the capital’s festival of cycling.

“This announcement demonstrates that the Prudential RideLondon festival of cycling continues to break new ground, not only in cycling but in broadcasting too,” he said.

“We are delighted that this world-class race will be shown live on BBC2, and even more pleased that the host broadcasters have chosen the Prudential RideLondon Grand Prix to showcase this revolutionary technology, which I’m sure we’ll soon see reproduced in other cycling events around the world.”

Now in its third year, the Prudential RideLondon Grand Prix has already become a sought-after title on the women’s international cycling calendar. As well as Trott, Bronzini and Johansson, the 2015 race features German dynamo Lisa Brennauer, fresh from winning the five-stage Aviva Women’s Tour, Britain’s Olympic team pursuit gold medallist Dani King, and Scottish rider Katie Archibald, who secured a pursuit silver at the recent European under-23 track championships.

The women’s race is the highlight of the Prudential RideLondon Grand Prix programme, which begins at 17:00 with the 10th Brompton World Championship Final and concludes with races for youth girls and boys.

The races will be preceded on Saturday by the Prudential RideLondon FreeCycle, when tens of thousands of cyclists descend on traffic-free roads in central London, and is followed on Sunday 2 August by the Prudential RideLondon-Surrey 100 sportive for amateur cyclists, and the Prudential RideLondon-Surrey Classic 200km road race, featuring many of the world’s top professional men’s teams and stars such as Sir Bradley Wiggins, Mark Cavendish and André Greipel.

Extensive communications campaigns take place to help businesses and the public plan ahead and get around on the day. This year this has included a leaflet drop to 1 million+ residents and businesses along the route, drop-in sessions for local people and community access plans. Transport for London (TfL) will also be providing up-to-date information through the @TfLTrafficNews and @TfLBusAlerts Twitter feeds and on the TfL website to everyone plan their journeys and enjoy everything London has to offer