NBC Sports to Provide Record Amount of Kentucky Derby Coverage

By Adam Flomenbaum 

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NBC Sports Group is devoting more coverage than ever to this year’s Kentucky Derby, “The Fastest Two Minutes in Sports.” The record 15.5 hours of coverage begins tomorrow at 4 p.m. ET on NBCSN, and will conclude on Saturday, the day of the race.

NBC Sports will make the coverage available to stream via its ‘NBC Sports Live Extra’ desktop, mobile, and tablet experiences. The ‘Sports Live Extra’ experience will offer fans four exclusive camera angles, additional analysis from NBC Sports commentators, and highlights from the “Road to the Kentucky Derby” lead-in races.

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As part of its sports coverage, NBC has been creating ‘All Access” social hubs. Similar to the experience created for the 2014 NHL Playoffs, the Kentucky Derby has its own social hub at nbcsports.com/Kentucky-derby-all-access. The hub features a collection of Derby Instagram photos and ‘Paddock 140: 140th Kentucky Derby in 140 Characters.” 

At the Derby, the Paddock 140 will house the Twitter Mirror and allow celebrities and VIP guests to tweet directly from the Red Carpet. The Twitter Mirror is being carried over from last year’s event. Celebrities will make their Derby picks onsite at the Paddock 140 through the Twitter Mirror and will be featured on-air during the NBC broadcast.

For the first time this year, NBC Sports will also be partnering with Vine artist Ian Padgham, who creates Vines specifically for brands. Padgham has nearly 350,000 Vine followers and demonstrates the possibilities for native advertising on social.

We said that last year’s Kentucky Derby was going to be the most social horse racing event ever, but NBC Sports appears to be set to eclipse last year’s efforts this time around. More, as exemplified during its Olympics coverage, NBC has been showing a commitment to “TV Everywhere” in making its programming increasingly available to authenticated pay TV subscribers.

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