This week, nobody’s as far away as Singapore (where we were for UFC Fight Night last week), but we have quite a bit going on across the border in Canada.
Mike Howley and Steve Hagerty have been in King City, Ontario, at the Maple Leaf Cricket Club for the past few days getting started on nearly three weeks’ worth of cricket coverage. It’s the Global T20 Canada cricket tournament, and we’re handling the primary transmission path out for millions of cricket fans in India. This inaugural six-team tournament will include the Toronto Nationals, Montreal Tigers, Edmonton Royals, Vancouver Knights and Winnipeg Hawks, as well as the Cricket West Indies B team. By the time all the matches are played, Steve will be our resident cricket expert!
Mike Lemieux’s going to be just up the road from Steve at BMO Field in Toronto, Ontario, for Major League Soccer when Toronto FC takes on the New York Red Bulls on Sunday.
Benny Griffis will also be heading into Canada this weekend for next week’s NASCAR IMSA races at the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, but not before he’s done in Watkins Glen, New York. There he and Rick Ball are transmitting multiple paths via satellite for the historic Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen. The action includes the Porsche GT3 Cup, Lamborghini Super Trofeo, Continental Tire Challenge, fireworks, a concert and, of course, the IMSA WeatherTech Championship race. What a weekend!
We’ve got more racing back in the States as well. Ben Bradshaw and Kyle Meyer are with C27 on-site at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Illinois, for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Overton’s 400 this week. Some of the other exciting events for the weekend include Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s first race from the broadcaster’s booth, the ARCA Scott 150, the Camping World Truck Series Overton’s 225 race and the XFinity Series Overton’s 300. This will be the first race of the year to air on NBC after what has been a great half-season with our friends at Fox. Looking forward to an exciting second half of the season!
It is already time for some football. Mati Kerpen with the Arizona truck and Todd Harvey with C43 are both at Highmark Stadium in Pittsburgh, Pennsylviania, for FIRST EVER American Flag Football League kickoff this Saturday. The American Flag Football League is a 7 on 7 flag football league comprised of eight amateur and four professional teams. Over the next eight weeks, the amateur teams will battle one another until they are down to one team left. The professional team, will also battle for elimination until they are down to one team. Then, on July 19 in Houston, Texas, the winning team from the amateur bracket and the winning team from the professional bracket will play each other for a prize of $1 million. All the games will air on NFL Network, and we are eager to be working with our friends there, as well as our friends at the Switch, to bring all the action to viewers.
Just across the river from Mati and Todd, Shelby Schmidt has been busy coordinating live shots in downtown Pittsburgh’s PIT Studio. This week she and her crew were busy providing production and transmission services for CNN, Fox Business News, Bloomberg and others.
How about a little lacrosse? Dave Buckman was at Harvard Stadium on Thursday for the Major League Lacrosse All-Star Game where the MLL all-star players will compete against stars of Team USA in their final match before heading to Netanya, Israel, for the 2018 FIL World Lacrosse Championship.
Rick Kolinek and K22 are at their summer home, University of Minnesota’s TCF Bank Stadium, for more MLS action when the Minnesota United FC Loons take on FC Dallas Toros on Friday night.
Why not a little bowling? Marty Smitherman and K38 will be at Boardwalk Bowl Entertainment Center in Orlando, Florida, on Saturday for the Professional Women’s Bowling Association U.S. Women’s Open that will be televised live on CBS Sports Network.
We’ve also got plenty of women’s hoops on the schedule. Brian Blomstrom and David Meyer were both on-site in Seattle, Washington, at KeyArena with C15 on Thursday when the Los Angeles Sparks take on the Seattle Storm in WNBA action. Brian showed David his first 10-channel “at-home” transmission while also showing him the ropes on the C15. With football season coming up, all of our engineers will have to be ready for a whole lot of multi-channel encoding. It’s going to be an exciting fall!
John May and CK48 will meet up with project manager David Gallardo at Chesapeake Energy Arena in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, on Saturday for a world class double header Top Rank Title Night special event where WBO super middleweight champion Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez will defend his title against Alexis Angulo. The co-feature for Saturday will feature Oklahoma’s own Alex Saucedo, hoping to keep his undefeated streak alive while battling hard-hitting Lenny Zappavigna in a 10-round special event. John will provide the origination feed for transmission paths around the world, and David will be dialing furiously to ensure boxing fans in every region are receiving a good signal from Oklahoma.
CK30 driving extraordinaire Joe Kelderhouse took the truck in to a couple of shops for some TLC while on the West Coast, and now he’s heading to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where he’ll meet Nick Ray for WWE’s Monday Night Raw. Both guys then head to Omaha, Nebraska, for Tuesday’s SmackDown show. There’s never much down time on the WWE schedule, and that’s the way we like it!
Last, but never, least, PSSI Global Services is golfing.
Craig Henry and C31 are at TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm in Potomac, Maryland, for the Quicken Loans National this week, and Tiger Woods is hosting once again with top golfers competing for a total prize purse of over $1.3 million. This marks the final year that this PGA Tour event will be held north of D.C. — starting next year it will move to the Detroit Golf Club. All proceeds from the tournament benefit college access programs and the Earl Woods Scholar program of the TGR Foundation.
Kevin Spangler and C47 are at Kemper Lakes Golf Club in Kildeer, Illinois, for the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship this week. This event, the third of five PGA Championship events, is the 64th PGA Championship to be played, with a field of 156 golfers competing for a prize purse of over $3.6 million, including a cool $547,500 going to the winner. Not bad for a week’s work!
We’ve got a busy week next week for the 4th of July. Mati Kerpen will be back in Coney Island for the Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest. Dave Buckman’s back in D.C. for the classic capitol concert event. And it is an absolute monster of a week in Las Vegas as the UFC is in town for Fight Week, culminating with the finale of The Ultimate Fighter and then UFC 226. More to come in next week’s roundup!