get TV abroad

Posts Tagged ‘F1 on BBC’

Just a quick reminder that Doctor Who continues this weekend… I know we have a lot of Who fans watching through Identity Cloaker. It's on in the UK on the 27th August, so get tuned in an watch it live or on the timeshift for the next 7 days!

We also have the return of F1 this weekend after the summer break (well Winter break for me in Australia!)…

So its a double TV celebration this weekend!

For those of you following the Formula One, and as I keep saying the BBC has by far the best coverage of every race, I have compiled the sessions times for you. All times are GMT+1,  i.e. they are the local start time back in the UK.

Friday: First practice 0855-1035, Radio 5 live sports extra and online.
Friday: Second practice 1255-1435 Radio 5 live sports extra and online.
Saturday: Third practice 0955-1105 Radio 5 live sports extra and online.
Saturday: Qualifying 1210-1415 BBC One, 5 live and online.
Sunday: Race coverage 1200-1535 BBC One, 5 live and online.
Sunday: F1 forum 1530-1630 online.
Sunday: Highlights 1900-2000 BBC Three
 

Remember you will only see the online page if you visit the BBC Sports website with Identity Cloaker already turned on, if you visit with your local IP they will not even show you the video box!

If you want a bit more vintage F1 action you can also check out Nico Rosburg's classic F1 choice, where you can see the 1985 South African Grand Prix in which Nico's father Keke competed. Again you are going to need to fire up Identity Cloaker in order to watch the vintage races as they are normally only available to those in the UK. Happy viewing!

Well what a treat the BBC have this week, as part of their ongoing series where current F1 drivers pick their favorite races from history we have all been given access to the 1979 French Grand Prix, a race famous not for who won rather who came second. Over the finals three laps the Renault of Rene Arnoux and Ferrari of Gilles Villeneuve fought wheel to wheel, passing and re-passing each other. Rarely do we see racing like that these days, though perhaps we are getting a glimpse of it at times this year with the new tyre situation. 

You can watch it at the BBC Sports F1 site, if you visit and you get this screen:

Then you are going to need to fire up your copy of Identity Cloaker, select the UK from the dropdown list of countries and click 'connect'. Then simply refresh the page (you may need to hold down <shift> and then click refresh) and you will no longer get the warning message.

Everything looked SO good when they announced they would be showing full practice and qualifying for the GP a few weeks ago here in Australia. Normally all we get on TV is a little bit of the qualifying and then the race, minus most of the buildup and analysis afterwards. For the Australian GP OneHD here in Australia showed everything! BUT. Now it seems we have gone back to normal for the Malaysian F1 GP and the only F1 on TV this weekend in Australia is the usual little bits.

Not if you have Identity Cloaker though!!!

Just like last year I have been able to watch the full practice sessions from the BBC website by using Identity Cloaker to get myself a UK IP address, check out the post from last year showing how to watch the Malaysian F1 GP from the BBC Sport Website.

The one downside of this is I now have much more of Eddie Jordan on my screen, not even Identity Cloaker can help with this problem!!!

For the race, if they don't show it in your country, you can also watch online via the SpeedTV website in America, however the BBC TV coverage is better (honest!).

Here in Australia they don't show the FIA Formula One practice sessions on TV, and at times they don't even show Qualifying! As an F1 fan this is a bit of a disaster, but as always the Internet has provided us with a nice way around this little problem.

While the BBC does not show the practice sessions on their main channels they do broadcast it in the UK on a sub channel, and they do also stream it live from the BBC Sports website.

If you would like to watch the BBC coverage outside the UK then follow this simple method.

1. Open Identity cloaker and select a UK proxy and click connect.
2. Visit the BBCs Formula One page, during live broadcasts you will see a big 'Live' symbol at the top of the screen. Click on this link and then a few seconds after the page loads you will see a popup window to the video stream. You will only see this if you have a UK IP address, those without a UK IP address will only see written commentary.
3. Pick the 'watch in a pop-out player' option, this seems to run better than watching it in the main browser window.
4. Once the video stream starts playing you can disconnect Identity Cloaker and the video will keep on going.

Just to show it working I made a quick video during todays practice session, you can check it out below:

The Formula One season has started, the first practice is already over as I write this and second practice about 40 minutes away.

Now not many TV companies actually bother to show the practice session, certainly here in Australia all we get is the race and qualifying. However have no fear as the BBC is showing everything!

Those in the UK can of course just turn on the TV and press the red button, but if you live abroad you can still view through the BBC website.

Normally when you visit the race pages from an IP address outside the UK all you will see is the text commentary, but if you fire up Identity Cloaker and select a UK location and visit the page as if by magic video will appear at the top!

You can also view directly through iPlayer  while abroad with the same method.

If the video does not start for you disconnect Identity Cloaker and connect again, as events like Formula One are so popular they seem to put a little more strain on the servers (I had to try 3 servers before I was happy today).

If you are new to the idea of watching BBC iPlayer abroad, or any of hundreds of other UK and US TV stations, then why not find out a little bit more.