Bahrain GP Media Coverage

Hey everyone.

I'm currently writing a feature as a part of my MA Journalism studies. The feature is about the media coverage of the Bahrain Grand Prix back in April and whether or not the coverage was sensationalist.

From my memory it certainly did seem to be blown out of proportion in comparison to what a large section of the F1 press were reporting at the time.

I'll also be looking to discuss the issue of whether a F1 journalist is correct to comment on the wider issues currently going on in the background of an F1 event. Or whether they should simply stick to their defined role.

In the above case it was obviously to do with the protests against the Bahraini government.

I'll principally be looking at the example of Kevin Eason of The Times and of Ian Parkes of Press Association who went into some of the villages around Manama to see what they could find out about events in the country.

Now if anyone has any comments to do with these issue I would love to here their opinions.

Many thanks,

Dan.

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Races: 163 - Wins: 23 - Pole Positions: 24 - Fastest Laps: 22
Season 9: Constructors' Champions

Seeing as you're doing an MA in Journalism, what I have to say might be stating the obvious to you! But, I will say it anyway just in case it helps


At first, I believed the hype that the media was creating - I was genuinely worried at one point that something might happen, and I was half expecting some kind of rebellion during the race. It even appeared that the teams themselves were worried - remember how some Force India team members went home?

Actually, that brings me on to another point - there were reports of those Force India team members getting caught up in a petrol bomb incident. I may have got my facts wrong here, but I seem to remember that some papers were saying things like "Force India attacked with petrol bombs", "petrol bombs land near Force India crew's car", but when the more reliable reports became available it ended up that they simply passed by a protest on the highway and they were nowhere near the bombs. Yes, there were petrol bombs being thrown, but not at the Force India team like reports initially had you believe.

When you see some of the reactions of the local people, and footage of what had been happening in the lead up to the race, you had to think they'd be mad to race in Bahrain. Of course, F1 can't take a political stance, but at the same time - you wouldn't hold a race in a war-zone, would you? You need to be responsible for all of the teams' safety. Lives are more important than sport at the end of the day.

I have no problem with the F1 media covering the situation in Bahrain, in fact I found it quite interesting and eye-opening. They are there to report how the weekend goes, and that's what they were doing. But, some WERE over-hyping it I think. But then again, if they hyped up Bahrain, then it was more than likely that they hyped up everything else to do with F1, too.

What was interesting to see was that, the very day after the Grand Prix, the media got bored of it and found other things to scare-monger us with instead. The Grand Prix passed without major incident, so what else did the papers have to say? Well, nothing. They didn't really care about the situation - they only really cared about selling news.

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You know you want to. [judgegrudge.mybrute.com]

Thanks very much for the comments Aaron.

Really appreciate what you've said. I'm just trying to get an impression from F1 fans about what they gathered from the reporting by the media.

If anyone else has any comments then they would be great to hear.

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Races: 163 - Wins: 23 - Pole Positions: 24 - Fastest Laps: 22
Season 9: Constructors' Champions

I don't know if you read Joe Saward's articles on Bahrain but I found them particularly interesting as he offers a bit of a different perspective to life and F1 to most other journalists. He also interviewed some locals.

Some articles from that weekend - there are probably more if you go back further;
[joesaward.wordpress.com]
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[joesaward.wordpress.com]

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X (@ed24f1)

Cheers Ed, yes I've read those articles. Certainly insightful.

Do you have any comments about his criticism of other journalists who went into the villages of Bahrain?

In my opinion it was quality journalism, but I know from comments on other sites that I've read that some people did agree with him.

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Races: 163 - Wins: 23 - Pole Positions: 24 - Fastest Laps: 22
Season 9: Constructors' Champions