Olsman in Lead for All 157.2 Miles of L.A. Marathon

Possibly the most difficult event to cover in television sports is a marathon.

So Channel 13 was undertaking quite an endeavor when, seven weeks before the first Los Angeles Marathon in 1986, it agreed to televise the race.

The person the station picked to make it work was Phil Olsman, a free-lance producer-director who had network experience doing sitcoms, variety shows, concerts and sports. But a marathon was something new.

Still, Channel 13 decided to make Olsman the producer because of his technical background. He knew what equipment was needed and how it worked.

There were problems that first year. For one thing, seven weeks really wasn’t enough time to prepare properly. And worse, problems with the communication system made collecting much of the important information and getting it to the viewers almost impossible.

Olsman has produced Frank Sinatra and Whitney Houston specials for international TV, but those telecasts were walks in the park compared to that first marathon. Or the second.

The communication system broke down completely in 1987, but production has run more smoothly since, and Olsman seems to have found a niche. He has become something of a marathon man.

Besides the L.A. Marathon each year, Olsman has produced five other marathons for various television outlets, including the Long Beach Marathon for Channel 4 last May.

Producing marathons is hardly the only thing Olsman does these days, as he wears two hats.

His day job is the L.A. Marathon. His night job is the new MCA-distributed “Roggin’s Heroes.” Olsman and host Fred Roggin are the co-executive producers.

The two met last year because of Channel 4’s Long Beach Marathon coverage.

“We did a few publicity lunches together and just hit it off,” Olsman said. “So Fred called when he was looking for some help with his new show.

“It’s really been a great relationship. Nobody in television works harder than Fred. He’s a real perfectionist.”

This week, after spending all day at Channel 13 in Hollywood getting ready for the marathon, Olsman spent Tuesday night and Wednesday night at the NBC studios in Burbank taping the 12th and 13th segments of “Roggin’s Heroes.”

Talk about shows that are as different as night and day.

“We can back up and redo anything that doesn’t come out right when we’re taping Fred’s show,” Olsman said. “I don’t think it would quite work telling 20,000 runners they had to go back to the finish line and start all over.”

Of Sunday’s marathon, Olsman said: “It’s like covering a football game with 20,000 players on a field 26 miles long.”

Olsman will have a crew of about 150 working on Sunday’s race. He said about 80% of the people have been with him since the first L.A. Marathon.

Despite the recession, Olsman said Channel 13 hasn’t made any cutbacks this year. “They’ve made a commitment, and they’re sticking to it,” Olsman said.

Olsman will use 27 cameras, including one in a blimp, two on motorcycles and two on other moving vehicles.

Olsman, for one, hopes it doesn’t rain Sunday. If it does, the helicopters, which are used to transmit signals, might be grounded, making the mobile cameras inoperable.

Barry Tompkins, who missed last year’s race because of a scheduling conflict, returns as the host announcer. He will be joined in the Channel 13 studios by Larry Rawson and wheelchair marathon commentator Bob Molinatti.

The most noteworthy newcomer is Florence Griffith Joyner, who replaces Vic (the Brick) Jacobs on the race-cam, which follows the runners in the middle of the pack.

Also, Julie Isphording, last year’s women’s winner, will join the on-air talent. She will be paired with Channel 13 sportscaster Tony Hernandez at the start-finish line.

Running expert Toni Reaves and Runner’s World publisher George Hirsch are returning, and also working the race will be Channel 13 reporters Pat Desilva, Bryan Jenkins and Dana Adams. Weatherman Gregg Kettner will report from the 13-mile water station.

Coverage begins at 8 a.m., with the race starting at 9:05. The entire telecast will be repeated at 7 p.m.

Maybe it’s a sign of the times that “Roggin’s Heroes” can get a 14.2 rating, while college basketball gets 1s and 2s.

NBC’s coverage of the war pushed “Roggin’s Heroes” from its usual 7:30 time slot on Channel 4 to 8:30 last Saturday night, where it got the 14.2, making it the highest-rated program on television in Los Angeles that day.

Through its first four shows, “Roggin’s Heroes” has averaged a 9.1 in L.A. and has done nearly as well in most of its other 150 markets.

Last Sunday, Arizona’s overtime victory over Duke on ABC got only a 1.0 rating in L.A. The game was opposite the Lakers-Detroit Pistons game on NBC, which got a 10.0 rating, but still something is wrong here.

The main problem is the saturation by college basketball. There will be 32 telecasts this Saturday and Sunday; ESPN alone will have 33 telecasts from Saturday through the following Sunday.

That’s fine for basketball junkies, but it makes it almost impossible for most games to get a decent rating.

TV-Radio Notes

The Lakers will make their second consecutive appearance on NBC Sunday. Their 12:30 p.m. game at the Forum against the Houston Rockets will be the second half of a doubleheader, after the Portland Trail Blazers play the Celtics at Boston in the first game. Pat Riley, who did the commentary on the Lakers’ game in Detroit last Sunday, will be back in a New York studio this weekend. He said he enjoyed the commentator’s stint, but there are no plans for him to do any more. Considering it was his first time as network commentator, Riley wasn’t bad, although he seemed a bit stiff early in the telecast. . . . Marv Albert and Mike Fratello will announce the first game Sunday, with Dick Enberg and Steve Jones handling the second. Joel Meyers will be the courtside reporter at the Forum, a new role for the former UCLA announcer.

Attention, Bruce McNall: Complaints have come this way that the King broadcasts on XTRA are hard to pick up in some parts of Los Angeles, particularly the San Fernando Valley. Another oft-heard complaint is that Bob Miller doesn’t do a simulcast for games that are also on Prime Ticket. . . . Gayle Gardner noted on NBC last weekend that O.J. Simpson was right on when he said after the Raiders’ playoff victory over the Cincinnati Bengals that Bo Jackson’s hip injury was serious enough for him to miss the Buffalo game the following week and could also cause him to miss a portion of baseball’s spring training.

ESPN has hired Paul Olden as a baseball announcer. He will work two games a week. Jerry Reuss will be among the new commentators. Gone is Norm Hitzges. An ESPN spokesman said Hitzges is leaving to devote more time to his Dallas talk show and also to announce the Texas Rangers’ home games for a regional sports network. . . . KMPC General Manager Bill Ward said he has made a deal with Dave Winfield to be a regular on Robert W. Morgan’s morning show during the baseball season. . . . KNX will provide radio coverage of the L.A. Marathon, beginning at 7 a.m. Reporters Bob Scott and Jon Goodman, who will be wired for sound, will run the course.

Bill Walton isn’t the only former UCLA star getting into broadcasting. Marques Johnson will do the commentary for SportsChannel’s tape-delayed coverage of the Southern Section I-AA basketball title game. The game is Saturday night, the telecast the next day at 9 a.m. Randy Rosenbloom will handle the play-by-play. . . . ESPN is televising the GTE West senior tournament, which begins today at the Ojai Valley Inn and Country Club. . . . Channel 11 offers another Dodger special tonight at 7, the Dodgers’ excellent 1990 highlight film. Vin Scully is the narrator.

The Superstars competition begins a four-week run Saturday on ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.” Superstars, conceived by figure skater and ABC commentator Dick Button, began in 1973. This year, for the first time, the competition was held at Cancun, Mexico. A major force behind Superstars in recent years has been Sean McManus, a senior vice president for Trans World International, which produces the event. As vice president of programming for NBC Sports in 1983, he bought the event for that network and it remained there until this year. As a TWI executive, he landed Jeep as a sponsor last year and later made a new deal with ABC. McManus’ ties to Superstars go to the first one, which he attended with his father, ABC’s Jim McKay, whose real last name is McManus but was changed many years ago because of a radio show.