ATLANTA – While shiny new all-sports channel Fox Sports 1 displaced Speed in the U.S. this week, the 16-year-old motorsports channel isn’t going anywhere and will remain serving fans in Canada.
In fact, Fox representatives say they believe the new Speed will be even better in the very near future since Fox Sports will now be applying its production might to many of the races to be shown on Speed – to go along with an expanded roster of races (cars and motorcycles, mostly) coming to the channel.
Fox Sports 1 will not make it to Canada (despite the fact their main prime time show, Fox Sports Live, is anchored by Canadians) since other broadcasters own the rights to so much of the programming it has in the U.S. (UFC on Sportsnet and NASCAR on TSN for example). So, Speed’s owner Fox could have either shut the channel down or keep it alive in all markets, except the U.S. It chose the latter and Speed will remain in Canada, the Caribbean, Puerto Rico and other international markets.
“Speed is excited that it is going to continue to provide the best of motorsports content to our subscribers in Canada and around the world,” said Fox Cable Networks vice-president of Canadian sales and marketing, Hawley Chester.
“People would miss this content if it weren’t available to them.”
While new original, non-race programming will be curtailed on Speed, familiar titles to fans will remain in the schedule, even if those series are no longer in production. “There has been no alteration of the service today and on into the future. Barrett Jackson will continue and we obviously own a tremendous amount of content, like Are You Faster Than a Redneck,” said Chester. “Those shows will remain in our library and will be used throughout the service at different times… We have thousands of hours of Pinks… a lot of it has never even been seen. We have a tremendous amount of content.” New series are not in the cards as yet.
Other content which the channel used to carry before it ramped up its NASCAR coverage (and that series minor leagues and qualifying days) is also returning to Speed, he added, which will satisfy the hard core race fans. “We will be able to bring back a lot of that content people have told us is missing like European Le Mans,” said Chester. “It could be and should be even better than the Speed you’ve had in the past.”
– Greg O’Brien
