Solomon was an advocate of enlisting fairway bunker cams for the net's coverage from CarnoustieGETTY IMAGES
The Open Championship began this morning and NBC Sports will broadcast 50 hours of live tournament coverage from Carnoustie Golf Links, the most of any golf event on the calendar. The net is in its third year with Open rights and Golf Channel Exec Producer Molly Solomon is excited for this year's installment in Scotland. Solomon spoke with THE DAILY from Scotland to share the challenges of covering the tournament at Carnoustie and how they'll cover the Jean van de Velde storyline.
Q: What is some new technology we can expect at the Open Championship this year?
Solomon: We’re always thinking about how we can better articulate to the viewer what the challenges of this golf course are, and with Carnoustie there’s obviously that monster of a finish. The bunker cams have really proved popular with viewers because it shows the challenges of trying to escape those. But we had never tried fairway bunker cams, so when we looked at the course we said, ‘Why don’t we try that?’ The conditions always affect play at the Open Championship and so we have wind indicators all along the course. We’re also using Links Tracer, which we’ve had before but it hasn’t been dry enough the last two years to really utilize it. We’re hoping that this technology can be used more often because it really shows where the ball lands and how far it rolls. We’re also bringing back the “Playing Through” split-screen format so viewers don’t miss any key moments during commercial breaks.
Q: What have you learned about broadcasting the tournament now that NBC is in its third year with Open rights?
Solomon: What we’ve really appreciated is the uniqueness of being able to show first tee shots and the final putt and how popular that’s been with viewers. You can wake up in the middle of the night on the east coast or start late on the west coast on Wednesday and go all the way through to Sunday. That’s proved to be very popular with us at NBC as well because you feel really involved in the Open Championship when you’re broadcasting every single shot.
Q: What are the challenges of covering the Open Championship at Carnoustie that you didn’t have in previous years?
Solomon: We’re glad to be going to Carnoustie with two under our belt because I think you get better at broadcasting the tournament every year. The one thing we have learned is how important the depth of our bench of broadcasters is. The 50 hours of live coverage at the Open Championship is the most of any golf event on the calendar. Having a very deep bench of analysts allows us the ability to give everybody a lot of reps and a lot of rest so that we’re at our best on Sunday.
Q: How prominently will you cover the Jean van de Velde storyline?
Solomon: We kind of all remember what happened, but it’s fun to go back and tell that story from different perspectives. We started a week ago with Golf Films’ “Go Down Swinging” documentary, where Van de Velde, the broadcasters and everybody involved took us through sequence of events. Also don’t forget, Justin Leonard was in that playoff in ’99 and he’s now on our broadcast, so that adds a different element to it. The Barry Burn in the protagonist in all of this -- and so many of our teases and historical montages feature it because it really is a monster -- but it’s part of the character of the golf course.
Q: The Men In Blazers will be hosting a nightly show from Carnoustie during the week -- how did that come about?
Solomon: We really want to build off their popularity to showcase the Open Championship to a different audience. When I talked to Roger (Bennett) and Davo (Michael Davies), they told me how much they loved golf, which I didn’t know, and they pitched last year coming to Birkdale to do some lead-up content from their own unique perspective. They did that successfully and we said, ‘Why don’t we actually do a nightly show with them at Carnoustie?’ The show promises to bring something different for our viewers.
