Harmon & Kelly

leftism

Jawgap wrote: »

The pronunciations are great- my own favourite is "Booooonen"

+1

Although my personal favourite from this years Tour was "Hoooogerland"

Have to say i love the Harmon-Kelly combo. Kelly has improved a lot over the years and he contributed a lot more this year than in previous. Beats the hell out of listening to Liggott-Sherwen!

Caught that "Chasing Legends" documentary, and the way Liggott went on about Garmin chasing down George Hincapie in 2009, you'd swear they had murdered his first born... My recollection of that stage was that Hincapie was hanging on for dear life towards the end and lost a bunch of time on the stage winner in the final few km's. Of course when Lance goes chasing down Simeoni they don't bat an eyelid... :rolleyes:

Chips Lovell

Another Kelly favourite: Henrick Hustler.

oflahero

Rovi wrote: »

Why Séan Kelly is the undisputed king of cycling commentators:
"Cow shite."

This thread may now be closed.

If I remember right, it continued something like:

"Er ha ha..." [nervous laughter from Harmon, casting around for the next thing to say] "...whereas, of course, in France it would be known as..."

Kelly [without missing a beat, but with faint yet discernible pride]: "Mousse de vache."

Lumen

kilns wrote: »

Liggot and Sherwin were awful at calling stuff, there was a flat stage and the breakaway were about 30 seconds ahead with over 10km to go and they were saying the peloton are getting worried and panicking now, when it was far from the case.

Harmon does that it a bit too. The rule of thumb seems to be something like 10s per km (or maybe 10km per minute, I can't remember), but you still get Harmon optimistically speculating about the breaks staying away before Sean says quietly "No, I don't think so".

leftism

Lumen wrote: »

Harmon does that it a bit too. The rule of thumb seems to be something like 10s per km (or maybe 10km per minute, I can't remember), but you still get Harmon optimistically speculating about the breaks staying away before Sean says quietly "No, I don't think so".

I reckon he tends to do that deliberately to try and keep it interesting for the general public. I'd say there is a huge percentage of the viewing public watching the Tour who don't have much idea of how the peleton operates... I remember watching a stage about 10 years ago and Stewie O'Grady rode on his own all day. He had about 7 or 8 mins and i remember being glued to the TV as the Telekon boys rode him down. Duffield was commentating and he had me convinced O'Grady could hold on! (Of course he was caught with 2km to go as per usual)

Adds to the entertainment for Joe Public, even if the poor lad hasn't a snowballs chance in hell of staying away....

Lusk Doyle

Captain Havoc wrote: »

I myself would have loved to see Wiggo on the podium.

Could you imagine his next book if he did get there "The story of how I found myself, got lost in myself, became a pr*ck to everyone (self admitted so no speculation/opinion there mods), went back to basics, found myself, won the TDF, did I mention how I went back to basics?"

Cycling weekly, etc would have some jingoistic field day for ever if Wiggo did this, Wiggo does that, Wiggo, Wiggo, OH WIGGO!

I'd say he would have been along the lines of Basso in the mountains had he made it.

Disclaimer - I don't have a problem with Wiggo!!!

Pdoghue

I agree with most of the above sentiment. Kelly is a superb informative analyst; there is no bull**** and he's not pushing any agenda - he calls it as it is. Compared to 'celebrity' analysts like say Dunphy or Hook, he cuts to the chase and does not seem motivated to come out with hyperbolic self-serving rants. Liggett and Sherwin leave me cold as well - that Chasing Legends film was just OK I thought.

My favourite Kellyism is the way he uses the French word 'classement' to describe the general classification, though he did starting referring to the classification towards the end I thought.

Having recently returned to Ireland from living abroad, this year's tour was the first I watched in any great depth since the days of live coverage on RTE with Jimmy Magee and Pat McQuaid. And that's going back a bit! Reminds me of my summer holidays long ago when you'd be flicking between the tennis on one station and the Tour de France on the other channel. It's just a fantastic TV sport - some of the Alpine stages were spectacular to watch on a large 42 inch widescreen TV.

Of course the sad part is is that the romance of the tour has been tainted with the dark side of systemic drug abuse in the peleton (At the moment I'm reading David Millar's book) And in that regard, as anyone who follows cycling to any degree will know, Kelly is not without baggage on that front. Which prevents him for being totally honest at times. He just can't be totally unequivocal. For instance you wouldn't see a 'how is the state of modern cycling' type debate on Eurosport a la Billo-Giles-Dunphy on football. So that is always at the back of my mind when I'm watching cycling on Eurosport.

The weirdest moment of the Eurosport coverage of the tour this year was when they had Sean Yates on - the guy sounded like he was drunk. Googled it afterwards and discovered that he's had a stroke - no prizes for guessing what caused it.

michael196

Hail 2 Da Thief wrote: »

I really enjoy listening to Kellys commentary & think him & Harmon work well together!

By the way, I notice all of ye who are complaining about Kellys accent are from the Pale. Stephen Roche popped into the Eurosport crew on a few occassions & I found it harder to understand him than Kelly!

not complaining at all, juts noticing the effectiveness of the accent.

me not from the pale, me from south tipp !!

mloc123

Rovi wrote: »

Why Séan Kelly is the undisputed king of cycling commentators:
"Cow shite."

This thread may now be closed.

When/what was the cow ****e comment?

Rovi

mloc123 wrote: »

When/what was the cow ****e comment?

It was during Stage 12, Cugnaux - Luz-Ardiden (the one with the Tourmalet in it).
People were sliding off the road left and right during one of the descents, and the lads were speculating as to the cause.

It got a mention in the thread here too at the time (July 14, Stage 12: Cugnaux - Luz-Ardiden 209km), post #42.

Actual Paramedic

The tax man wrote: »

Harmon was grand this year,a few times I thought he over reacted at times when it came to the crashes but I think the Giro was still fresh in his mind.
Still chapeau to the lads for filling hours upon hours of coverage where nothing was happening to something worth listening to.

Loved Duffield till he lost the plot.Grew up on Liggett+Sherwen but just don't like their style any more. It's probably still the same as it was back in the day.

Harmon when Wiggins crashed was mad, he was shocked and keep saying "ah Bradley, surely its not his collarbone, ah please don't let it be his collarbone" Kept expecting him to say please let it be his arm and not his collarbone...

Agree with you on the Liggett-Sherwin combo, grew up watching them on the Channel4 show every evening at 7, but Kelly is just so much better and Duffield is like a hyperactive child after drinking coke and eating Skittles.

Hermy

Agree with the comments on Kelly but I don't have one good thing to say about Harmon.

Lusk Doyle

Hermy wrote: »

Agree with the comments on Kelly but I don't have one good thing to say about Harmon.

Bit harsh

downwiththatsor

seven stars wrote: »

All I saw of the ITV4 show was the TG4 highlights, featuring Liggett and Paul 'in the sport of professional bike racing' Sherwen. Understandable I suppose that they'd be pro-british, but Liggett really was going into overdrive about the Manx Missile during some of those sprints, using the phrase ‘Manx Missile’ (or variations thereof: ‘Missile from Man’, etc) repeatedly in the space of about 5 seconds.

Itv can be a bit painful wrt the brit cyclists but i enjoyed their highlights programme for extra interviews, finish previews by boardman and post stage analysis.
Eurosport for live coverage won hands down, Kelly's analysis, pronounciation and dry humour are priceless.
Enjoyed the pre-stage analysis with richardson too.
Dont mind Harmon, he is enthusiatic and draws Kelly out of his slumber:D

ajk24

I saw sean outside the boardwalk/examiner offices in cork today. He was doing a photocall for something or other - jeans + an post - sk jersey + vitus bike + lots of trendy media types hanging around him. launch for SK Tour of Waterford or what?

Was heading for lunch with some colleagues who dragged me away in case they wouldn't get to eat if they waited for me to conduct some hero worship.

thebouldwhacker

For me, I think they do a great job, I enjoy their commentary.

Kelly really brings the whole sport down to earth and keeps the reality of just how hard it is out there for the riders.
As for how he talks, everyone on the planet has an accent and how hard they are to understand or whether you think its nice or not really says the same amount about where the listener is from as it does about the speaker... just the way it is. Homogenised media has everyone talking the same, thats why you know kelly ain't a commentator, he's a cyclist that commentates.
If its cow sh***e, its cow ****e!

CHIPPY1979

To put it simply Harmon and Kelly are undoubtable the best combination in cycling commentary circles , although I can only compare with ITV and TG4.

Eurosport wouldn't put up with these guys for so long if they weren't bringing in the viewers. Kelly is an absolute legend, says it as it is and more often than not is right with his predictions (stage finishes) and how riders are performing or not during a stage, inevitably who is going on to win or to be dropped and IMO is the star of the airwaves.

On a personal matter, I and a mate met Kelly at the the Tour De Burren. We had signed up to do the Etape and asked him for any advice in how to climb Alpe d'Huez. After a couple of seconds Kelly said 'Put your head down and pedal like F**K'. A couple of weeks later we knew exactly what he meant, he was right on the money again!!

Hermy

CHIPPY1979 wrote: »

To put it simply Harmon and Kelly are undoubtable the best combination in cycling commentary...

That's your opinion.

lukester

I like the Kelly/Harmon combination a lot.

But I get irritated by Harmon's excitability and frequent tendency to get seemingly obvious things completely wrong.

When Sean speaks, I listen.

Funkyzeit

Kelly/Harmon are a smashing combination.

Carlton 'unfunny' Kirby on the other hand.....

Malari

Funkyzeit wrote: »

Kelly/Harmon are a smashing combination.

Carlton 'unfunny' Kirby on the other hand.....

Aw, I really like Carlton's crap jokes! I realise more and more I am in a minority of people who like this kind of humour. My boyfriend doesn't know how lucky he is...:o

Anyway, Carlton isn't great on cycling info when he's commentating on his own, though he does know seem to know his stuff on the Dakar.

seven stars

Did anyone else watch the Eurosport highlights package than ran for about 1.5 to 2 hours in the evening? I've no problem with the Harmon/Kelly commentary, but they had an annoying habit of just showing you 'chunks' of the race, with no context or explanation of what had happened in between. Example: on the Alpe D'Huez stage, Evans was up with Contador and Andy Schleck one minute, then (after an ad break) he had gone. No indication of why either - he could've been dropped, crashed, abducted by aliens, etc.