Mark,



You make a couple of great points.



Video is very important. According to techs, the new system will work from a distance of about 5 miles depending upon a few atmospheric conditions. One way to get around it is to make the committee boat a "collector" for the signals, amplify them there and then forward them to shore via a different setup. From what I am told this is the best way to do it and depending on altitude of the antenna the distance can be quite far. Actually, one way to increase the range of the camera units is to place the reciever higher like tethering it to a balloon (another way to get the sponsors name out there).



As far as venue's alot of things are suppose to happen on shore that also draw attention (press conferences, meet the team events and etc -- I hate to keep going back and comparing to nascar but they have had about 50 years to get it right so alot of what they do will be reused in a slightly different format)



Steve