Amazon Prime’s “DocuSeries” of the MotoGP championship will debut on March 14. “MotoGP Unlimited” will consist of 8 episodes of 50 minutes each.
This first series will follow the 2021 season that resulted in Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha) being crowned champion. There was plenty of drama in 2021 that the series can exploit, including Valentino Rossi’s retirement, Marc Marquez’ comeback and injury struggles, and the destruction of the relationship between Maverick Viñales and Yamaha.
The March 14 debut of the series is roughly 1 week after the 2022 MotoGP season starts at Quatar on March 6. Here is the trailer for the series:
I like the old documentaries around the time of the switch from 500cc to 990cc… Narrated by Obi Wan Kenobi!
I still follow the news to see who wins most every week, but they ruined MotoGP for me when they made it a subscription service. I travelled long distances to attend a couple of races, and considered myself more than a casual fan before they did that. I’ll watch this series and I’m sure I’ll enjoy it, but as long as it requires a separate subscription service I’ll never follow MotoGP as closely as I once did. The F1 series on Netflix drew me in and now I watch live or record every race, and I plan to attend the race in Austin this year, but F1 is smart enough to realize the way to build a fan base is to make it readily available for the casual fan to watch. We have no shortage of compelling sports on network TV, cable networks or streaming services that don’t require a separate subscription. If they want to grow the sport they need to bite the bullet and contract with ESPN, or Fox sports or some other network, and make it readily available without a separate subscription.
Has MotoGP gone to subscription only, or do you mean you just don’t have any other means to watch it where you are?
I’m sure MotoGP would love nothing more than to broadcast primetime on ESPN. I’m not really sure how those deals are put together, but I would think it is ESPN that has to decide if the revenue MotoGP will generate for them is worth licensing the rights and the opportunity cost of giving a slot to MotoGP in lieu of some other sporting event or content. I would imagine in Spain or Italy, you can probably watch the races on their local channels because the ad revenue would support such.
In any case, I’m the opposite of you. I used to watch races very occasionally but still followed the sport in print. Ever since MotoGP started offering it’s streaming service, I now watch not only all the races but the qualifying and practice sessions as well as the Moto2 and Moto3 races. I also like the post-race interviews, press conferences and “After the Flag” race commentary. Best of all, I can watch whenever I want as well as races from 20 years ago if I want.
If you are a true fan of the sport, it might be the best $150-ish you spend all year.
This is good news. I can’t get enough Moto GP, nor any other type of motorcycle racing. I just re-upped my Moto GP video pkg.
Mark
Peco
Fabio
Frankie
Jack
Zman
A documentary series about the 2021 season? Streaming a week after the 2022 season begins? Spoiler alert: Quartararo wins.
Documentaries typically examine the past. WW2 doc spoiler alert … Germany lost.
We know that. How many people who watched the “Drive to Survive” F1 series knew much/anything about F1 before they discovered it?
This has the potential to reach many times the number of American viewers that the MotoGP broadcasts do.
Want to see this racing story? Subscribe to this streaming service. Want to see that racing story? Subscribe to a different streaming service. This method will reach people already interested in the sport, but not reach potential new fans. No way to grow the sport and fan base.
It’s airing on Amazon, not some tiny service no one’s ever heard of. It will reach a bazillion potential new fans.
I’m not going to subscribe to Amazon to watch any one show. Would you?
No, I wouldn’t, but that doesn’t apply to those aforementioned bazillion people who already subscribe to Amazon. Also, if someone was already debating whether to subscribe to Amazon for their bazillion other shows, or maybe for the online shopping and shipping discounts, the addition of this series might just tip that person over the fence.
Me spending money to support MotoGP or Amazon ain’t gonna happen.
But here’s a video of Stoner talking about sliding that I found interesting.
https://youtu.be/LmOaCkoIPQQ
Wow! What a well thought out and useful post.
I know. Some day, if I practice enough, I might be able to offer riviting, spine tingling content like yours.
Or maybe I won’t live long enough. Time will tell.
WOW this looks great! Maybe we’ll see a resurrection of interest in our sport here in America as we’ve seen with F1? Can we be so hopeful?
Fantastic, I can’t wait.
If it’s as close as the F1 series of Netflix it should be an awesome series or even better for us motorcyclists.
yup – looks to be good!