While the world ski championships started this week in Courchevel, with a first world title at stake for Alexis Pinturault in combined, a subject has been agitating the small world of stick planting in recent months, that of television production “at the father” of this winter sport. But before we dive into the subject, let’s look around us for the times that Gerard Pique hangs around, he who seems to take a malicious pleasure in throwing himself on everything that is done in sports on TV like the pox on the lower clergy, to revamp it in his sauce, with more or less success. It’s good, no Barcelona on the horizon? So let’s go.
Long before his title of world champion won on Tuesday, Alexis Pinturault had given us an appointment in the 16th arrondissement of Paris to discuss his biography, From gold to crystal, published by Marabout. On the menu of this exchange, among other things, the delay of alpine skiing in its relationship to television. “In France, skiing is not widely publicized, we find ourselves little or not on free channels, we have reduced airtime and the way in which it is presented to the general public is a bit archaic”, listed he then.
An opinion shared 100% by Christian Salomon, the new media and marketing director of the International Ski Federation (FIS), who spoke to AFP of the urgent need to modernize this sport on screen. “We have to change things that have remained the same for 20 or 30 years. On screen, not much has changed since the 2003 World Championships.”
Formula 1 as an example
Anyone who has ever planted themselves on their sofa to follow an alpine skiing event knows it, the pattern is classic, deadly boredom and sleep never far away. To simplify, it gives this: two or three mountain images just to set the context and we go straight to a daunting succession of descents of skiers or skiers whose, helmet and glasses oblige, we rarely recognize the faces when they are soar. The races themselves, filmed statically by cameras dotted along the route, don’t stimulate our lazy brains much either.
While the drone made its very first appearance at these world championships, there is still a lot to be done to make this sport a little bit sexy in the eyes of the general public. “Overall, the same images and angle of view are found year after year and this lack of creativity in television productions is one of the reasons which reduces the spectacular aspect of this sport, which is however naturally spectacular”, breathes Pinturault. Drones, on-board cameras, better sound recording to experience the race in the shoes of the athletes, but also improvement of live race data on the screen (acceleration speed, number of g taken by the runners) are all avenues to explore in the future.
When we ask them the question of what it would take to pimp all that, the specialists all have the same example in mind: Formula 1. interested more people and today they are back on top. What has changed is above all the TV production, asserts Pinturault. Channels use on-board cameras to bring the race to life differently, they make things livelier, not to mention the Netflix documentary Drive to Survive which has done a lot of good for this discipline to gain in popularity and which has served to make the general public better understand what is being played on and off the circuits”.
“If you don’t add a bit of storytelling, alpine skiing has real drawbacks on TV,” we say on the side of the French Ski Federation. The athletes are wearing helmets, they are not recognizable, and from one weekend to another, or even from one race to another, the leaders are not the same. So we need to tell stories, and that requires a much richer production. »
FIS, TV rights and editorialization of the discipline
In the offices of the International Ski Federation (FIS), since the appointment of the new president, the Swede Johan Eloasch, in 2021, the question is taken very seriously. But there are many obstacles, starting with the thorny subject of TV rights. So far, the FIS, which regulates all Olympic snow sports (Alpine skiing, Nordic skiing, freestyle skiing, snowboarding), except biathlon, has chosen to leave the management of TV rights to the national federations, organizers of the various events of the annual World Cup circuit.
For their part, they have sold their rights to the sports marketing agency Infront, which in turn resells them to broadcasters and sponsors. However, this represents a substantial source of income for these national federations. While some countries such as Austria and Switzerland produce and broadcast their events themselves, with colossal technical and financial resources, 80% of the races are therefore managed by Infront. “However, Pinturault tells us, Infront’s goal is to make money, not lose it, so there is a lack of investment and risk-taking that is obvious from a of realization. »
By regaining control of its television rights, the FIS could also stimulate another revolution, that of the calendar and race formats, which today offer little leeway to sports channels to innovate from a editorial. Channel Director The TeamWho acquired the broadcasting rights of four French World Cup races as well as those of the 2025 world championships, Jérôme Saporito makes the bitter observation: “Today, what is skiing on TV? Combined round 1 stops, we switch to freestyle, then we come back to round 2, etc. However, for the general interest and the popularity of this sport, the chains need time, breathing space, to enable them to present the discipline, its champions, its stakes and its rules. »
And this one to take the example of biathlon, the channel’s flagship product for several years. “This year we are going to do more than 300 hours of biathlon against 100 hours five years ago. And we can see the result, five years ago a biathlon race had half the audience than today, because since then we have invested in the editorial. Because we were given time to do it, ”he appreciates. By choosing to sell its rights primarily to free channels, and by offering these channels the possibility and the time to develop the narration around biathlon, the IBU has shown the way for the FIS. What delights our new combined world champion. “We must follow this example, it would democratize our sport and rejuvenate its audience. In any case, things are clear: either alpine skiing is undergoing a revolution, modernizing and opening up to a new public, or it is slowly dying”.