ITU Triathlon World Championship
PMTV Host Broadcaster for Inaugural Washington DC Race.
Elite triathletes from around the world raced back-to-back through the heart of Washington, DC for the first Dextro Energy Triathlon ITU World Championship in the USA. This Triathlon spectacular had a one-of-a-kind backdrop of the nation's capital which welcomed competitors past its monuments, memorials and museums as triathletes competed on car-free roads through the Nation’s Capitol.
PMTV was contracted to be the HOST BROADCASTER to provide the WORLD FEED on behalf of SPORTFIVE GmbH & Co and The International Triathlon Union (ITU), as well as Unilateral facilities and crew supplier for ZDF Network Germany and LED bid screen service for Upsolut and the Local Organizing Committee.
PMTV Services consisted of supplying: Two television production mobile units, one Graphics & Editing trailer, 1 RF systems mobile unit, two Satellite uplink trucks, 85 technical personnel and world feed director on site. Also PMTV supplied the large LED screen at Finish Line with full production equipment and personnel, and all coordinating services required of a Host Broadcast.
For the World Feed PMTV utilized two Game Creek Video mobile units, including the 53’ Southern Cross expando production truck and a 53’ support trailer which housed Graphics and Editing systems. Due to the security constraints of working in Washington DC, (no helicopters were allowed), PMTV’s project manager Stan Leshner and our RF vendor Broadcast Sports, devised a solution to get full coverage of the entire course by utilizing high powered Microwave gear strategically positioned from the Potomac River swim course, on to the Bike course loop and finishing with the foot race to the finish line. PMTV devised an 11 camera coverage system, reusing cameras in multiple race locations (swim/bike/race) to capture the event in entirety. Using both fixed and moving Microwave transmitters (Boat Camera, two motorcycle cameras) that were transmitting all signals from the course to RF receivers atop a very unique 200’ crane truck parked at the TV broadcast compound on Pennsylvania Ave. and also used were 70 ft towers at Potomac River swim site and the Capitol Hill receive site.
For the ZDF Network Unilateral, PMTV provided another Game Creek mobile unit, KU Satellite Uplink truck and 8 additional local crew to augment ZDF’s production and technical staff.
For Upsolut Sports AG and the Local Organizing Committee, PMTV provided a 9 ft by 12 ft mobile LED video screen system. PMTV also included production equipment to feed the LED screen, including switcher, audio mixer, tape machines, computer graphics and a RF Camera. PMTV also supplied full technical crew for this production.
The most challenging part of this production was only having one setup day available for this major technical project as the city could only block off traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue at 13th Street (the compound area) for setup Saturday and race day Sunday. The race course streets (Independence Avenue, Constitution Avenue, 12 Street and Pennsylvania Avenue (from 13th Street to Capitol Hill) were only blocked off for Race Day. PMTV and its vendors and crew met this challenge and the program was very successful.
“This was a very challenging event to pull off considering the constraints of working in the Nation’s Capitol, the abbreviated site access schedule, but with concise logical planning, quality technical facilities, highly experienced TV crews and vendor engineers, we were able to achieve the technical performance levels we had set for the show” said PMTV’s Project Manager Stan Leshner .
The race aired on NBC Universal Sports in the USA, multiple overseas broadcast outlets, and an archived webcast is available at this website: http://www.triathlonlive.tv
Adobe Flash Video Clip: DVD footage from Universal Sports Air.
For more information please contact:
Stan Leshner
Account Executive
PMTV
E-mail: sleshner (at) pmtv.com
