From a studio overlooking the Dolomites to workflows routed through Milan and into Salford, the BBC delivered a “lean and mean” operation for its Winter Games coverage.

With Milano Cortina 2026 the most geographically spread-out of the Winter Games to date, the event has presented challenges and decisions for broadcasters as to how they choose to cover it.

It has been a balancing act between budgets, likely medal success and editorial priorities and, as with many broadcasters – particularly those that are publicly funded – the BBC’s presence at an IBC during a major event continues to decrease as technology allows for greater remote production.

Speaking with SVG Europe at the IBC in Milan, BBC Sport chief engineer and head of operations Richard Morgan says: “This is fundamentally similar to Paris 2024 albeit we’ve evolved it, we’ve shrunk it, and we’ve put more of it back home. It’s a model that has evolved and evolved and means we’ve got less infrastructure and facilities (in Milan for the 2026 Games compared to Paris 2024), but we still have access to anything we need, so it’s very efficient.”

For the BBC, the priority was to secure a studio in Cortina for an authentic, snow-capped view of the Dolomites. A smaller footprint and fewer staff at the IBC in Milan have contributed to the BBC’s ability to base its presentation team in Cortina.

“The technology side is so much more agile as time’s moved on,” says Morgan. “We have a smaller and smaller presence on site at the IBC, but no loss of functionality. In fact, there is possibly more flexible functionality than we’ve ever had; it’s small and perfectly formed.”

In terms of what’s been omitted from the Milano Cortina IBC compared to the setup for Paris 2024, there is no editorial decision-making in Milan – that is all based in Salford, along with digital and website operations, while TV-centric planning is in Cortina. There are also no off-tube commentary booths, no post-production facilities, and no store-and-forward capacity at the IBC.

What remains is switching, with a team of technicians and engineers taking in feeds from the other Winter Games locations in Italy.

In Cortina is the BBC’s studio, plus two sets of commentators across curling and sliding, three presenters and two camera operators.

In Livigno, where skiing, snowboarding and cross-country are taking place, there are eight people, including snowboard commentators Ed Leigh and Tim Warwood, commentator and presenter Jenny Jones, alpine skiing commentator Matt Chilton, plus a producer, two members of the BBC Sport Stories team and a camera operator.

In Salford, where BBC Sport is based, there are four off-tube commentary positions. Decisions on where to place commentators are based on several factors, including whether they can see the field of play. For example, Leigh and Warwood are on site for snowboarding as their commentary cabin allows for a view of the athletes coming down the halfpipe. One exception is ice hockey where the field of play is visible but there is no GB team competing. The same applies to sliding, which has provided strong medal prospects, and where the ability to speak to coaches and see the athletes is valuable. In total, there are seven commentary positions across venues.

BBC Sport’s head of major events and general sport Ron Chakraborty says: “With Ed and Tim, they don’t just do the commentary, they do lots of filming as well. I saw a great piece they’ve done with one of our reporters where they are teaching them to snowboard. So, as long as they’re getting out and about and doing stuff like that as well and helping to show off the host venues, then that brings value to them being there.”

A vast OBS feed selection is managed via capacity management and track shuffling. Unilateral feeds such as studio cameras pass through the IBC for monitoring and QC but are decoded directly in Salford. Signals from LiveU packs in Cortina and Livigno also pass through the IBC, where they are coordinated and filtered before being sent back to Salford.

Chakraborty says: “We worked out what is the fewest number of feeds we can have to get back everything we need, which was 12. There are 15 disciplines of eight sports compared to 32 for the Summer Games in Paris. There’s 37 in LA and trying to juggle those, especially when Great Britain are great at so many of these sports, will be a challenge.

“But here, we thought we can do this with 12. It allows for whatever sports are going on, whatever mixed zone content we need, and the odd bit of beauty shot too. But even with that, if we need, we can shut off one of the beauty shots and just record a bit of it back in Salford. So we’ve juggled those really well, just to keep it lean and mean.”

NEP Connect provides international connectivity from the IBC to Salford, while the BBC provides its own encoding and mountain-to-Salford connectivity over the NEP backbone. Everything contribution-wise is IP-based, with SDI used for the OBS host package.

Morgan says: “We take SDI from OBS for the host package, because it’s lower cost and easier for us to deal with. But from an actual contribution point of view, it’s all IP…like everything these days, the secret’s all in the networking. So we have an on-site (at the IBC) networking team that look after and support our needs, because everything that’s coming in unilaterally from the venues is all IP – there’s no baseband video, from our point of view, coming in.”

In Salford, along with digital and online production teams, there are a few craft edit suites and two galleries from which BBC1 and BBC2 output is remotely produced.

In terms of the use of the cloud for distribution of OBS signals, Morgan says challenges remain. He says: “Off-prem cloud is part of the strategic technology roadmap for the BBC, but to go cloud off-prem but when you’re talking about low latency feeds is still a challenge, because it needs to go to the cloud and back down again, and if you’re talking live workflows, that will introduce latency whichever way you look at it.

“Latency is obviously significant for us, especially if you’re trying to do two-ways between people in venues and in studios in places like Cortina. But things like (the OBS digital platform that delivers ready-to-use media) Content+ where we can access the host server remotely – that’s great, especially when post-production is back home.”

Canadian systems integrator BSI is responsible for the build at the IBC. Morgan says: “[BSI] did our Commonwealth Games in Birmingham in 2022 and the European Championships in 2022. It might appear a bit strange for a UK broadcaster to be working with a Canadian system integrator, but we go to tender with our work, and they’re a trusted partner who deliver.”

With remote production a tried and tested model that has continued to evolve, the challenges have been less technical and more to do with the uncontrollable elements of a Winter Games.

Morgan says: “The weather during the get-in in Cortina threw everything at us. The build for getting lorries on site was very challenging. We had HGVs with snow chains on them sliding around on the hillsides. It was challenging, and some of the lorries couldn’t get up to the top of the site. So yes, the weather! Of course, you expect winter weather on a winter Olympics, but the conditions were challenging. Great for the pictures and the look of the Games, but technically a little bit challenging. So, we’re hoping that the weather during the get-out is a bit kinder to us.”