Below is the video of Speed’s final moment and the first 20 seconds of FS1 as seen via a DirecTV subscriber. I’ll go into more detail on the transition below.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=onFLCsEL_GU?rel=0

I wasn’t really planning on taking in the launch of FS1 but then again it wasn’t really ruled out as a possibility. I’m on the West Coast and 3am on Friday/Saturday for me is somewhat business as usual.

The somewhat unexpected thing is that I went out with a friend for drinks earlier and she’s worked for 5 years in the motorcycle track days and racing business. I asked her what channel was key to following that sport and she went on to talk about how awesome Speed is. I  crushed her spirits telling her what was only a couple hours away. Not really being familiar with Speed or personally knowing anyone who was a regular viewer, I hadn’t really put much thought into the unfortunate transition for them until tonight.

I was curious as to how technically the change would happen. It was being communicated that FS1 would be channel 219, but MAVTV was already parked there. Speed was in the 600’s and hunting down some tweets from DTV, the explanation is that everything would magically just work at the stroke of 3am.

And it did.

I dvr’d MAVTV and the recording basically stayed with the channel as it moved from 219 to 214. The channels in between didn’t even feel a thing!. And with that, I’ll probably never watch or talk about MAVTV in my life again.

DVRing Speed magically migrated the recording to FS1 but then my DVR, clearly flummoxed by this shell game cut off the recording.

When the smoke cleared FS1 was on 219 at 3am, Speed signed off at 3am, the program guide updated, the channels moved (no idea where Fuel/FS2 is or if I get it),  and now there is another channel that is in the rotation. How much love it will get and how this changes the sports media landscape remains to be seen but 30 minutes into the launch nothing has gone wrong and ESPN has shockingly not submitted their unconditional surrender.

Cheers to the folks at Fox. Welcome and please don’t suck.

[Photo of Curt Menefee’s welcome to FS1]

About Ben Koo

Owner and editor of @AwfulAnnouncing. Recovering Silicon Valley startup guy. Fan of Buckeyes, A's, dogs, naps, tacos. and the old AOL dialup sounds