Tour de France coverage

Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen are merely doing off-tube commentary, from near the finish line, on the world feed pictures. I found a recording of SBS (Australia)'s coverage, and they were there too - not sure if they're maybe the world feed English commentary?

But you're right, they'll have had no input into the TV pictures; nor, by the sounds of it, any advice from the directors to let them know what was coming up. Or perhaps they did, but it was in French.

I read elsewhere that Liggett was also commentating for NBC, but only him and not Sherwen, which might explain the repeated facts from time to time ?

I heard Sherwen on NBC yesterday so that can't be right.

Or is it the other way round ?

Nah, they both are on NBC. And occasionally will read out links and promos for NBC. But also they are heard on the world feed. It's their ability to read separate things on separate stations that I think many people are puzzled by, especially how the hell it actually works.

No different to the BBC's F1 commentators who can blank out saying, '..and The Andrew Marr show is
now on BBC 2' on the world feed. Though it does'nt always work, as I witnessed once watching a race in South Africa

James Allen never used to bother on ITV F1, as on classic races on Sky you can hear references to ITV. You'll notice the gaps in commentary during the ad breaks where they will keep quiet unless something happens they need to mention for the highlights programme.

The South African broadcaster (as does/did the Australian) buys the BBC Commentary rather than it being the world feed (which has no commentary).

Does the coverage just have one set of commentators then or do they have a cricket style arrangement where they alternate every so often. It sounds like they need to do the latter.