After just one day of the Olympics it is already clear that the coverage will be on all day every day in the background in our flat. It's a strangely familiar scenario, long summer days of sport half watched whilst decorating, writing, reading the paper, or... just about anything else.
The BBC are showing coverage of every single event, if not on one of the TV channels, then via 24 different streams from the website, as well as their radio coverage. If you want to watch London 2012 you've no choice but to watch it on the Beeb. Not a problem you'd think; our country's oldest television channel has plenty of experience in sport coverage, and has had seven years to prepare.
Which is why I was so disappointed by the Men's Cycling Road Race. To be fair, most of Britain was disappointed by the result; Mark Cavendish had been duly hyped as the likely winner of the race, a notion heightened by the British win of the Tour De France just last week by the mighty Wiggo. But it wasn't Cav's finish way back in the Peloton that disappointed me. It was several elements of the coverage that had me up in arms.
I am not a cycling aficionado; cricket is much more my bag. But my boyfriend is, and I've picked up the odd nugget of knowledge recently with the Tour de France highlights being the main feature on our TV every evening of late. His first outcry was down to the lack of information available to the viewer, the BBC unable to inform us of the time gap between the leaders and the Peloton (main group of cyclists) he tells me is on a par with a close run chase in a limited overs cricket game where the viewer doesn't know how many runs are required. Unimaginable! Jake Humphries later apologised from the studio, but still...
Our main gripe however, was the wayward commentary from ex World Champion and a Commonwealth gold medallist Hugh Porter. He's wheeled out (no pun intended) for any cycling commentary, be it bmx, mountain biking, or road racing. He's obviously very knowledgeable, and a British legend, but it was painful at times to listen to him get it so wrong. Aside from struggling to know which country was which, let alone which rider, his most farcical comments came at the finish line, when he claimed Greipel was pushing for fourth place, apparently entirely unaware that about 20 riders had already crossed the line.
Never mind BBC, lets go to some other cycling pundits who will be able to really breakdown what happened. OR, lets go to some other sporting commentators who don't appear to have any knowledge on the race, but can commiserate with a nation about the fact that Cavendish didn't romp in with the first gold for team GB. Yes the nation are disappointed, but we're also interested in what happened in the race, and perhaps some analysis as to why Cavendish has once again had a forgettable Olympics. The 15-minute BBC news broadcast an hour later gave more insight than the pundits.
Aside from the commentary, the visual coverage left something to be desired in my opinion. The commentators were having to ask for footage to be shown, and what they were discussing was, more often than not, not what was on the screen.
Theses faux pas were then accentuated by a mix up in the studio that led to Sue Barker's cycling wisdom going unheard, replaced by the less than intelligent words over the talkback, querying what the letters COL meant on the silver medal winner rider. Er, Colombia?! One of the few things Porter did get right in his commentary.
I don't want to be down on the Games, or on the BBC, but come on, we can do better than that can't we?