Speed Channel out, Fox Sports One in
Where Did The Speed Channel Go?
I just tried to watch my usual Saturday morning racing minus F1 of course that won’t happen until later this month at the Singapore GP. Where I live in Los Angeles Speed is viewed on channel 468, I think, I never really pay attention to the number, I just look for the call letters on the guide.
This morning I must have spent 20 minutes scrolling up and down in the general area with no success, at which point I yelled to my wife that Speed was not there, in its usual place, just vanished, like Houdini it disappeared. My wife got tired of hearing me yell about it and also tried to locate the channel, also with no success. She then did the next sensible thing (unlike me) and went to her computer to investigate.
Imagine my absolute surprise when she came back to inform me that Speed really and truly did disappear, Fox, who owned the network, killed it. Wow, just like that, no more Moto GP, no more American Le Mans series, or the Rolex Series. No Australian V-8’s or European GT racing, or Motocross, or a whole host of other racing that will no longer have a home, at least for the time being.
With F1 and IRL both being carried on NBC’s sports network this season, I have not checked in on Speed as much, but with NASCAR and all of it’s different iterations, the Barrett-Jackson stuff and their other programming one would think there would be plenty of interest to keep the channel going. I guess not. NASCAR has moved to Fox Sports One and everything else, who knows if we’ll see it again? Here is some more info and I will try to find out where the sports car racing with eventually end up.
Taken from Autoweek, March 5th 2013:
The soon-to-launch Fox Sports 1 network will take over much of the motorsports programming currently offered by Speed TV, beginning with the Aug. 17 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race from Michigan International Speedway. The confirmation of the long-known switch and plans for FS1 came Tuesday in New York from Fox Sports Media Group co-presidents and COOs Randy Freer and Eric Shanks.
From its upcoming debut, FS1 will offer almost 5,000 hours of live news and original programming each year. Its schedule will include college basketball, college football, NASCAR, soccer and UFC, and it will be available in over 90 million homes. FS1 will be the largest sports cable network, and one of the largest cable networks of any type.
“Our ‘secret,’ admittedly a very poorly kept one, is now revealed,” Shanks said during the announcement. “Fans are ready for an alternative to the establishment, and our goal for FS1 is to provide the best in-game experience possible, complemented by informative news, entertaining studio shows and provocative original programming.”
Its NASCAR programming will include select Sprint Cup races as early as 2015; immediate coverage of Truck Series races; future coverage of the Sprint All-Star race; all Speed Week events, including Daytona 500 qualifying, the Sprint Unlimited in 2014, then 2017-22; and the Budweiser Duels in prime time. Events currently on Speed will move to FS1.
The new network also will carry Sprint Cup and Truck Series practice and qualifying sessions, NASCAR Race Day coverage with pre- and post-race coverage, the weekly NASCAR Victory Lane wrap-up show and Race Hub, the daily mid-day studio show with breaking news from drivers, owners and crewmen garages.
Overall, Fox Sports 1 will concentrate on Big-12, Pac-12 and Conference USA football and basketball, Major League Baseball playoff games (starting in 2014), UEFA Champions League, EUFA Europa League and CONCACAF international soccer and the UFC. It also will have a host of daily in-studio sports talk shows (one of them hosted by Regis Philbin) and a large offering of game-day NFL pre- and post-game shows.
-jp- (and what the hell am i going to do now with nothing to watch, my wife just answered, fix that kitchen)
AmerF1can 
always weird when a channel just disappears. Maybe the clue is the name Fox Sports 1. Hopefully Fox Sports 2 and 3 will arrive soon, and will carry Moto GP, American Le Mans series, the Rolex Series, Motocross, etc.
Randy
like you say, hopefully…