Dave and Brian's Excellent Adventures

My Olympic Moment

It’s not that I’m lazy. I mean, I’ve been MEANING to write this, as my final thoughts. I’ve just been having trouble trying to figure out what my Olympic Moment was during the Torino Olympics. My father talks about every Olympics he’s been a part of having a good Olympic Moment and a bad one.

Figuring out the bad Olympic Moment is easy. After working for three weeks making sure that the show we produced was the best we could do with the equipment we were given, we had a very bad moment. The day of the second to last show started, just like the several before, just fine. We signed in with the BOC (Broadcast Operations Center, with the Hub that all of the feeds from the different venues hits, and then goes back to New York, and then distributed out to the World) and checked all of our equipment with them to make sure everything we had was in perfect working order, just like we had everyday we had a cross-country event.

After the show, everyone took a break and had lunch. When we came back, to voice over our show, to get it ready to send the BOC, we realized ALL of our footage had audio which was out of phase. Without getting terribly technical, out of phase audio is BAD, to the point of unusable. And, it’s not like we can have the event happen again, and re-record it. We fixed it as best we could and sent it out, but it just left a bad taste in my mouth. This is not how I wanted to end my Olympic Experience from an almost perfect venue.

Figuring out the good Olympic Moment is difficult. When I showed up to the Olympics (my first) I had no idea what to expect. I had very little information about I would be given to work with and what the workflow was going to be expected from our production team. After three years of working with New Century Productions (NCP) working on the World Series, US Open (Tennis), and several ESPN Sunday Night Baseball events, I felt pretty confident that I could handle the venue. But, I wasn’t positive.

When I got there, I was handed a set of drawings and shown where the equipment was. I started to go to work. After hooking up all the gear (Monitors, tape machine, switcher, etc) I felt pretty good. I knew everything could change once the production team showed up, but I didn’t realize they were going to change everything. In the end the joke around the compound was that our C-World Venue (A-World is like Hockey, Figure Skating, etc) was more like a “B-minus Venue”.

We made prime time twice, once scheduled and once due to another prime time venue getting cancelled due to weather. Our venue was featured as a segment on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (I’m not sure how many venues were featured on The Tonight Show, but I felt good we were used). They had showed one of our events where a cross-country skier tripped every competitor and therefore became dead last, but he finished with a Silver in the event. The joke was that when his trainer/coach gave him a new ski (as he had broken one) Frode Estil (the tripped skier) light a rocket attached to his boot. Funny stuff.

It was an amazing experience to ski in the Italian Alps, twice. Even though I got lost at one point, skiing from Italy to France and back, and almost died (Sorry, Lindsay). I got to work with an excellent crew, who were a joy to work with. None them ever got very grumpy (at least at me) and they asked instead of demanded.

My good Olympic Moment has to be the final dinner. The production team gave my father and our Broadcast Manager (Willeta Dement) a bottle of wine and a hoodie each. Then our producer, Rob Hyland, went around the room and congratulated each of us and said some kind words about us. And then my father stood up and congratulated everyone, and praised me. As my father stated we each got on each other’s nerves from time to time, but it’s always been a joy to work with. It’s sad (if you believe what he says, when he says he’s retired from doing the Olympics. We’ll see!) to think we won’t be able to work together on such a momentous event like the Olympics. Of course there will be many other projects he and I will work together: After all we both own the company.

So, to Dave Raynes, my father, I thank him for my Olympic Moment. To Lindsay and Eva Raynes, my wife and daughter, I thank them (again) for standing by me when I need the love and support that they give. It’s tough being gone for so long, but they help with their love and support to make it easier and worthwhile.

Thank you for all your kind words, Dear Reader, as so many have commented on our Blog.

Stay close, as the next adventure is in May, when I work on the Endeavor with Dr. Ballard our in the Mediterranean.

posted by DaveandBrian @ 1:07 PM