Behind the cameras, in a place little known by the
MotoGP fans, hundreds of journalists cover each GP from the press
office. For them, the Grand Prix is even longer than for the riders.
"More than 10,000 press credentials are processed each year for the #MotoGP, do you know how many just for TV?
The GP is very long at the media centre
In a European Grand Prix, on a Sunday at three in the afternoon, the
MotoGP winner has just been announced. The riders still have some work
ahead of them: parc fermé, the podium, the press office, the meetings
with the team afterward to analyse the day... But for the journalists on
the circuit, at least a lot of them, they have many hours of work to
do.
The media centre is their base camp, their second home. It's there that
journalists, camera operators, and photographers meet, with more than 50 different nationalities. To give us a clearer idea: the GPs can be broadcast for up to 83 TV channels.
Sometimes, the time difference between the circuit and its country of
origin obliges many journalists to stay in the media centre until very
early in the morning to finish their respective reports on the race.
Other times there are journalists from specialized magazines who
sometimes need to have the magazines out on Tuesday. In any
circumstance, there's no other option than to work on Sunday until the
job is done and ready to appear in the publication's next edition.
It's not a small amount of work either. The minimum coverage that we see
in this type of magazines, reporting every detail of the recently raced
GP, is 12 pages. But it generally goes beyond that, and it's not
unusual to have to write 18 or 20 pages in the end.
The second World Championship family
All
this work goes on until late and begins quite early.
One could say that the Grand Prix begins on Thursday. In the afternoon,
the official press office opens the GP, with the presence of the main
players, but in the morning is when the movement really begins. It's
media day, when the most famous riders give interviews, pose for
photographs and do special promotional events and even themed events on
occasion.
Photo: meme "What makes a GP go"
However, even though it's clearly a demanding job, it's a different atmosphere, and
atmosphere of community, of constant collaboration.
Many of the journalists have known each other for decades and that
helps create a good collaborative atmosphere. You need a specific photo
but unfortunately you were on the other side of the circuit and couldn't
get it? There's no problem at the media centre: it's teamwork, and
you're going to find the help that you need, or that photo that you
couldn't get. Quid pro quo.
Monitors, times, sheets
This work centre has rows of monitors that offer the journalists two
options that they have to do at the same time: broadcast each session or
each race (there's nothing like seeing each bend in a GP), and the time
monitors, because in the end the differences between the riders have to
be watched.
Data like fastest laps can also be seen on these monitors, as well as
the information that every journalist is hoping to read after each fall:
"Rider OK". The total times of each session are also printed and
delivered to the scoreboard on time.
THE MEDIA CENTRE IN DATA:
• The media centre has a
high speed internet connection and satellite connections to transmit the television signal.
• More than
500 credentials are given per GP, to media from throughout the world, whether television, magazines, digital media, or radio.
• In total,
more than 10,000 credentials are processed per year, of which more than half are for TV.
• Dorna has their own team for filing and editing the GPs live, with
more than 200 people, not including the local people that help the team.
• In each GP there are
more than 70 tons of equipment,
with seven main control units, some 30 cameras for different parts of
the circuit, and more than 70 micro cameras for the motorcycles
(including gyroscopic cameras). There are also the high frame rate
cameras that move through the paddock and the pit lane ,the high speed
cameras, and the helicopter cameras.
• The system used by Dorna allows for the simultaneous viewing of
multiple cameras in HD. This can always be seen in the media centre. It
also allows for the new pay TVs that offer these services.
