Posted by Les Faber in Here’s one for the books! Official Olympic broadcasters around the world have apparently been warned by Games organizers that there is a chance that the Men’s cycling road race may be postponed because of smog.
Olympic broadcasters have been put on notice that they may need to find alternative programming if the air quality was not considered safe.
The road race is the premier event of day one of the competition and is scheduled to last from 11 AM until about 5 PM (local time – this evening in Canada).
From Fox Sports Australia:
It is understood officials have said if it is smoggy in the tomorrow, a 1.30pm start deadline (two-and-a-half hours behind schedule) has been set for the race to start and, if not, the event could be postponed for 24 hours. The women’s road race is scheduled for Sunday.
Tour de France runner-up Cadel Evans is a medal contender in the race and it is understood organisers were so concerned with the air quality in Beijing today they had no choice but to inform media outlets.
At one stage it was believed that rowing events could be affected.
A postponement of the road race would cause chaos for Australian broadcaster Seven because coverage of the race was expected to last most of the afternoon and into the early evening in Australia.
What next?
Say it ain’t so!
Well, it did happen after all and Channel 7 did a good job covering it live for us. All the six hours of it. Looking forward to the women’s race tomorrow.