May 1, 2024 • 57 mins
Sports broadcasters are “armed with being good storytellers, delivering the facts, doing peoples’ athletic performances justice, and having fun,” according to NBC broadcaster Leigh Diffey. With over 25 years of international broadcast experience across many different sports, Leigh Diffey is a master storyteller on this week’s guest on If I’m Honest with Julia Landauer. Discussing how broadcasting fell into his lap while in university, Leigh shares the moment he realized his natural enthusiasm for sports and competition organically translated to his announcing, keeping the audience engaged. Leigh explains the importance of having self-belief, the Aussie “Have A Go” mentality, as well as capitalizing on networking and nurturing relationships. Leigh describes how he lives for “the moment” of victory or failure in sports, and how that crescendo varies by sport. Julia and Leigh discuss the similarities between broadcasters and athletes, the technical elements of delivering a broadcast, and the delicate nature of needing to comment on controversies and tragedies, which both require empathy. Leigh closes out by sharing his pre-broadcast rituals, his distinction between being “on edge” and being “nervous,” and the one sport he hasn’t yet commented on that he’d like to.
Follow Leigh on Instagram and X at @leighdiffey
Learn more about Julia Landauer at https://julialandauer.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hello everybody, and welcome back to another episode of If
I'm Honest with Julia Landauer. If you have ever watched
motorsports or the Olympics, you have probably heard Lee Diffy
as a broadcaster or a commentator on those events. And
let me tell you, I am pretty pumped to share
that he is our guest on this week's episode of
If I'm Honest. So Lee Diffy has been in TV
(00:26):
sports broadcasting for over twenty five years. He's originally from Australia,
got his start in motorcycles and supercross and that discipline.
He's worked in network TV sports on three different continents,
in Australia, in the UK and Europe, and in North America.
He has called more categories of high level motorsport on
network TV than anyone else in the world. Paris will
(00:49):
be his sixth Olympic Games, with three Winter games and
Paris being the third Summer game. He's the first foreign
voice played by a play person, to call the Indy
five hundred to the US audience, to call a NASCAR
Cup Rice to a US audience, and to call the
Olympics for NBC Sports. He is someone who I have
seen on TV for decades now, and something that is
(01:10):
always so cool to listen to is that he brings
this incredible enthusiasm to his commentating, and he is naturally
very curious and disciplined and thorough in his preparation, and
he appreciates the art of sport and capturing the intensity
of that moment where you're either winning or you're failing,
(01:31):
or whatever it is. And this conversation was really cool,
partially because I felt like I was fangirling a little bit,
and it was kind of like getting to chat with
someone you've always looked up to and admired, and I
think he does so much for the sport of auto
racing that it was really cool to be able to
have this one on one and we talk about everything
(01:52):
from his roots and how he got into commentating. He
was originally a pe teacher. We get into what brought
him to the UK and the leaps of faith that
he took throughout his career. We talk about what innate
traits he has to his personality that have helped him.
We talk about the adrenaline of telling a story in
(02:13):
front of a live audience, the adrenaline of being able
to watch sports live, and we get into some nitty
gritty stuff about how you put on a broadcast and
what goes into the preparation, and how he's learned really
intimate details about different sports that he may not have
known much about before. So it was really exciting. It
(02:34):
was really interesting as one performer to another. In a sense,
we found a lot of similarities between broadcasting and this
live audience storytelling and actually being in the car and racing.
It was a really interesting discussion. I am so grateful
that Lee took the time out of his busy traveling
schedule to sit down with me and to chat, and
(02:56):
he kept it really honest, and I really appreciate that.
I hope that you enjoy this episode. Lee, thank you
so much for joining me on If I'm honest with
Julia Landauer.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Hey, it's good to be on here.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Finally, finally, No, this is so cool because for our listeners,
we've been following each other on Twitter. I'm a big fan.
I've been watching you for years, and so this is
just really cool, especially as two people who do different
types of storytelling. I would say I'm really excited to
get into some of your techniques and just some of
your background, and thank you again for joining me. So
(03:31):
to get started, I learned this recently. So you actually
got started as a competitor in motor sports on motorcycles,
is that correct?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Yeah, just as a kid. You know, I had my
first motorcycle when I was six years old, and my
dad was really into motorcycle racing for whatever reason. My
grandfather raced and rode bikes and so race off road
motorcycles on the road, but wouldn't let my father do
(03:59):
it a figure, so kind of my dad lived vicariously
through my brother and myself, and so motorcycles were our life,
you know, like for other kids in the neighborhood they
played football or cricket or tennis or something like that. Well,
the diffies were the motorsport people, the motorbike people. So
and you know, growing up in the seventies and eighties,
(04:21):
that was pretty weird like that. We definitely stood it out.
That wasn't the norm. You know, people didn't understand it.
And certainly motorcycles weren't in the mainstream like now where
you see with X games or Monstrategy, Supercross Pro Motocross
SMX World Championships. The exposure that the sport gets now,
it didn't have back then, so to say that you
(04:42):
did motorcycle racing as your sport was really quite odd
at the time.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Yeah, no, that makes sense. So then I have to
ask because of what I read and tell me if
this is wrong, but that when you were elite teenager
you got kind of got started in your commentating career
with motorcycles. So is that accurate?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
Also pretty close?
Speaker 1 (04:59):
I was.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I was at university and I had stopped writing, focused
on school, tried to do a little bit better, and
I ended up going to university to study education to
be a pe teacher. And the local motorcycle club that
my brother was still riding at and a lot of
my mates were still racing at. I had made speeches
(05:23):
on behalf of my brother and the local motorcycle club
just said, hey, you're pretty confident for a young guy
behind a microphone. We need a public address announcer and
we'll give you sixty dollars And I sat in the
Queensland Sun all day. But for me, it came naturally
because I knew the competitors and that was at a
(05:44):
track that I used to race at, and so it
was a nice easy way of getting into it. I
didn't grow up wanting to be a sports broadcaster or
a motorsport announcer or whatever. It was one of those
stories where I literally fell into it.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Well, it's also pretty cool that you got paid on
your first gig. I feel like so many creatives have
to volunteer their time for their first stuff to prove themselves.
So that's I mean, that's pretty great. That's a great deal.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
Hey, when you're at university or college, sixty bucks is
sixty bucks I toil get.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Yeah, it's something to work as well. I mean, like
I when I gave my first paid keynote address, and
it was right out of college, and you know, they
I had given a ted X talk, so I knew
I had this polished video that somewhat you know, gave
me some credibility. But they asked me, okay, cool, we'd
love to hire you. What's your fee? And that was
something where I had to do so much research and
(06:34):
I totally undervalued myself. But it was so cool to
just have that baseline to then build off of and
get smarter about that. So that was a Yeah, it's
an interesting way to start. So that's great. So then
so then did you did you go into any kind
of training or did you really just test the waters
and how you delivered your broadcasting. And obviously you said
(06:58):
that you have this relationship with the competitors, which brings
so much color to any kind of broadcaster announcing. But
it was it kind of just figure it out.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah, I just figured it out and listened to the
feed that feedback that my parents gave me and some
other friends and you know, friends' parents who were at
the race track or wherever that may have come from.
But the best form of feedback was that the way
that it grew was other clubs. So one of my
(07:30):
favorite stories that I didn't know until many years later,
was that the first place I ever did it was
at the Ipswich Motorcycle Club at a racetrack called Tivoli.
And about an hour from where that was our hour
and a half from where that was was Twimba and
there was a track called Eco Valley. Well, the most
famous racer from Tiwimba is the Indy five hundred winner
(07:51):
will Power, two time IndyCar champion well Lo and behold
the promoter that I worked for way back then at
Echo Valley. Will will Power's mum used to be his bookkeeper,
and yeah, just the small world story. So, you know,
I first did it at Tivoli, then I did it
at Echo Valley, and the people from another club in
(08:14):
northern New South Wales in Ballina, they heard me, and
so it kind of grew bit by bit by people saying, hey,
we heard you at Tivoli or we heard you in
Balaner and we heard you. And so to me, that
was pretty good feedback that I must have been doing
an okay job if they if they then asked me
to travel to wherever their club was to again, and
this is not radio, this is not television, This is
(08:36):
very you know, this is very basic, rudimentary public address
sitting in a wooden tower, one microphone, you know, a
transistor radio as the as the break entertainment. You just
stick the microphone up against the speaker of the radio.
And it was fairly bare bone stuff, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah, But but I feel like every every discipline like
that has unique styles and you know, unique ways that
you engage the audience and engage the crowd, and so
to be able to take such such bare bones tools
and do it well and clearly make a name for yourself,
and I feel like. It also emphasizes the point that,
especially when you're getting started, if you're passionate about something,
(09:18):
curious about something like, forget about the audience because it
might be small stars to start, but you never know
who might be there or how it can catch on.
And that's literally it worked out for you. So that's
really cool.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Yeah, I think the thing, I think the thing that
I discovered very early on, maybe even on the first day,
I can't remember, but I know, I know it was
very early on that I displayed genuine enthusiasm for what
I was seeing in front of me. So if there
was a pause, if somebody was going to make a
position or lose a position, or it was the last lap,
(09:53):
and my voice, you know, I went to you know,
went into an excited mode and tone, and then at
the same moment, because I'm sitting on the edge of
the grand stand, et cetera, I could see people's reaction.
And so that was the first time I ever remember
I remember not necessarily cause an effect, but maybe action reaction. Yeah,
(10:17):
you know, you know where where the tone and the
heightened sense of my voice actually impacted the crowd. And
so it was the first time I ever realized that
you could. You know, they talk about having the crowd
in the palm of your hand. I'm not sure it was.
I don't want to exaggerate. I'm not sure it was
that great, but it was. It was you could you
could understand how you could influence the crowd with your
(10:40):
excitement level, and that that was quite intoxicating.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Yeah, I mean, and that's that's such a good point.
It's interesting that like you got to like really very
clearly visibly see that because I feel like, you know,
as a as a viewer of any sport or any like,
any broadcast you do, you feed off of people's energy.
And it reminds me of the Winston Churchill quote where
(11:04):
he says success consists of going from failure to failure
without loss of enthusiasm, and just that that key that
being enthusiastic will give you motivation, confidence, it'll make other
people excited about what you're doing, and can confirm that
you continue to deliver that in your broadcast. And I
would assume, especially for any kind of viewer who might
(11:25):
be is a more casual fan of any given sport,
they can be hard to jump into and so kind
of taking cues from the commentators as to when something
really exciting is happening helps the viewer in their own
learning journey.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
So that's really cool, Yeah, very much. So I agree.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Yeah. So I'm always interested in when people make really
big moves. And obviously you're from Australia and you move
to the UK first and then to the US. So
can you walk through a little bit how that happened,
if it was an intentional decision on your part, if
it's somewhat kind of fell into your lap, and what
it was like moving so far away from home.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I wish I wish a lot more things fell into
my lap, that's for sure. But maybe I wouldn't have the.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
You got the big one, you got the big one, right?
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Maybe maybe Yeah, I wouldn't have the story that I have,
But I have a I have. I have kind of
a recurring story with different parts. But the part is,
you know, work really hard, make great contacts, cherish those contacts,
and be in the right place at the right time.
And so I got into television in Australia, not at
(12:34):
the local level, not at the regional level. I started
straight at the network level, which is highly unusual. But
it was again right time right place, and they had
a need for me. I got in through my commentary,
not as a journalist. I don't have a degree in
journalism or communications, so I openly admit I kind of
(12:56):
got into the network through the back door through my commentary,
and the head of sport at the time at Network
ten in Australia said, look, you're going to fill the
commentary role, great, but you need to learn more about
TV and sports television in general. So I'm going to
get you a job on the nightly sports show where
you can be a freelance reporter. So it's kind of
like ESPN Sports Center. It's a show that's no longer
(13:19):
around sadly in Australia called Sports Tonight, and it was
a really epic show. It was fantastic and it taught
me a lot. Taught me that the nuts and bolts
of television, and it exposed me to even though I
was a peach teacher played all kinds of sport as
a kid, it taught me a lot about I mean,
you could go in for an eight hour shift and
sit there and watch I have to log, you know,
(13:42):
CNN World Sports, and you could be going everything from
baseball to basketball, to Premier League soccer, to whatever it
might be, you know, whack it within whacky sports, or
you might sit there for an eight hour shift and
cover a cricket match and be logging, you know at
this time code such and such hit a for this time,
code such and such was caught out, you know, And
(14:03):
so it really just there was a lot of long,
long shifts. But I was working with these legendary television
people who hadn't only ever seen on TV, and I'm like,
what the hell am I doing in here? You know.
It was really it was really quite a trip. And
then things happened very fast for me. I was given
a lot of great opportunities and maximized on those. And
one of those opportunities was to travel overseas and do
(14:25):
some Formula one launchers and I met some terrific people,
kept their contacts and stayed in touch. And then through
one of the producers that I was working with in Australia,
had the opportunity to go to the twenty four Hours
of Lomont and to do a documentary. And that was
in the late nineteen nineties, in ninety eight and ninety nine,
(14:45):
and it was in the second year that we went
back to Lamont to do the same documentary. A dear
friend of mine now who back then was a colleague,
an older gentleman who I had worked with in television
for a little bit, and he was also another reporter
on this documentary. And he just said to me, he said,
what do you think of it over here? What do
you think about all this? And I thought he was
(15:06):
talking about Lomore in the event. We were standing in
the pit lane, and I just said, it's fantastic and
he said, no, I'm not talking about the race. I'm
talking about you over here in the Northern Hemisphere. And
I said what do you mean And he said, you
could make it over here, you could do it.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Oh, so were you just visiting for that?
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I was just yeah, yeah, I was still living in Australia.
And he said you could. He said you could do it,
and he said he said, live my dream for me,
and he said you could do it. And that was
in the June of nineteen ninety nine. And in January
of two thousand, I was living in London. Oh my goodness,
I left. I left, you know, I was only in
my twenties and I left an amazing job at Network ten,
(15:42):
I was doing V eight Supercars, I was doing IndyCar,
I was doing Moto GP, I was working on Sports Tonight,
and you know, for somebody's still in their twenties, it
was an amazing job. And I left and the network
couldn't believe that I left, and I didn't have a
job to go to in the UK. I really just
swung for the fences and through some really great friends
(16:02):
and contacts, I had a little bit of voiceover work.
But within a month, within a month of being in
the UK, I was interviewing with the BBC and got
a job to commentate the World Superbikes. So before before
my head could stop spinning, I was back on a
plane to Australia covering World Superbikes at Phillip Island. That
I was in South Africa, then I was in Japan
(16:22):
and it was an amazing will Wind Wind journey for sure.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Yeah, yeah, that's impressive. So then, so digging into kind
of your mindset a little bit more like when you
you know, you have this great setup at home, and
you obviously really impactful trips over to the UK, but
what would you say you were naturally curious and wanting
to expand your world. And you know, when you were little,
(16:49):
did you think you might want to get out of
Australia or is it just let's see, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Not at all. I just I grew up in suburban
Brisbane in a very blue collar family, and you know,
mum and dad were just regular people and my dad
was a painter and a sign writer. My mum was
a teacher THEYD and you know, living the life we
did in pretty humble surrounds and having the motorbikes, that
(17:19):
was pretty good. We thought life was great. We thought
life was great at that and then when this commentary
thing came along and that started opening my eyes to
different opportunities. And then I just I don't know why,
because my mum and dad were quite shy people, and
so I don't know why, but I was always I
(17:40):
was gifted with I don't want to say in abundance,
but enough self belief that I believed I could do
as good as or better than that next person. And
so maybe sometimes falsely believing that, I don't know, but
I backed myself. I always backed myself and maybe sometimes
(18:01):
embarrassed myself. I don't know, but I didn't care because
I was going to have a go, and my dad,
particularly my dad. My mum and my dad always, but
my dad, that was one of his sayings and it's
a very odsy thing to say, is have a go,
which means just try right and have a go, mate,
is what people say. And I was determined just to
have a go and whatever that was or whatever it
(18:23):
looked like, I was going to have a go. So
I left my childhood home, left mom and dad and
went to Sydney to swing for the fences, to have
a go. And I didn't have anything to go to
and had some great people supporting me. But I was
doing substitute school teaching. I was just baking carrot cakes
and selling them to the local cafe for my gas money.
(18:45):
I was doing whatever I needed to do to be
in knee number one spot in Australian media, to get
that opportunity. And so once I made that commitment to myself,
I was going to do whatever it took.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I absolutely love that. And I feel like, you know,
the more that every person can kind of embrace that,
like what's the worst that can happen, or more proactively
like I will figure this out. I can do this.
I think there's a lot of undervaluing ourselves or you know,
other people undervaluing themselves in a way that you know,
(19:20):
usually we're getting in our own way. So that is
just so uplifting and inspiring. I was getting goosebooks. Thank you.
We're going to take a quick break, but we will
be right back with Lee Diffy on if I'm honest
with Julia Landauer. We are back on if I'm honest
with Julia Landauer with our guest Lee Diffy. So I
(19:41):
get a lot of adrenaline when I get on stage,
and like, I'm sure you can appreciate like the high
of engaging an audience as you talked about, and you know,
making people have these reactions that you know or a
direct result of what you have done. Can I assume
that you still get some kind of highlight that when
you're in the broadcast booth.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Oh yeah, for sure, for sure, because it's it's everything
all into the into the pot. It's, uh, you know,
we're we're we are armed with being good storytellers, you know,
delivering the facts, doing people's athletic performance justice and they're
(20:20):
having fun right with each other, enjoying it yourself, but
enjoying being with your teammates. And that could be whether
I'm doing the the Olympics, the Track and Field World Championships,
or it could be doing IndyCar, whatever I'm working on.
You know, I make sure that all of the teams
that I'm a part of is that we get on
off air. So we get on on air, and when
(20:43):
you're all on the same level and you're all you
all feel like the show's going great and everybody's everybody's
right at their level, it's it's it's it's terrific because
you hope, I mean, we get more immediate feedback now
social media. You know, the old yardstick was the ratings,
(21:05):
which it still is, but you know, your superior is
what they tell you. But you know, you get feedback,
whether it be positive or negative on social media, and
we know with pretty much immediacy whether the audience is
enjoying it or not. And so we try and not try.
We do enjoy what we're doing, and we try to
(21:26):
make it so easy to consume for the viewer to
have fun as well, because if we're having fun, we
hope that they're having fun.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Yeah, no, that makes total sense. And you had mentioned that,
you know, you you naturally bring an engage in enthusiastic
kind of tone to your broadcasting. Do you find that
you are naturally a fan of most sports or is
it the competition that just you can figure out what's
exciting about? Because you commented on you know, as you said,
(21:55):
track and field, Olympics, racing, like all kinds of racing.
Like do you just love all the sports?
Speaker 2 (22:00):
I love sports, and I love them. I love the
competitive angle, but I love the moment, right, So what
is the moment? What? What? What is it about that
moment that defines winning or losing, scoring that touchdown, making
the part whatever it might be, you know, making that
perfect run down the down the mountain, in the bottle sled.
(22:21):
What what is it to me? It's that I see
a lot of what we do in live television in
the athlete. And when athletes come off whatever field it
is and come into my world and into our world,
they conquer and they agree with that and they they
sometimes I don't even ask them that, I just can
tell by the way they speak. And what that is
(22:43):
is split second decisions with no do overs. Mm hmmm.
And that's what we have. We can't delete the paragraph.
We can't we can't erase it and go over. I
didn't really like the sound they got that. And when
people give us a hard time sometimes on the broadcast,
you know, I would almost beg that they think about that,
because in life, we're humans. We're going to make mistakes.
(23:05):
I'm going to say every word that correctly that I
want to say to you on this podcast, and that's
okay because we're human. But in the height and heat
of a live sports broadcast, you know, we don't have
any doovers, and it's split second decision making and the
connection between this and this has to be has to
be really good. And I see that in athletes, whether
(23:27):
it's drivers, you know, do I make a move, Do
I break a little bit deeper here? Do I go in?
Do I hit him just a little bit? Do I
do this? Or track and field do I kick? You know,
it's on the last lap, I'm on the last lap.
I've got three hundred meters to go. Do I kick now?
But do I wait till one hundred and fifty to kick?
That split second decision making to me is fascinating and
(23:48):
that's what really gets me going. And it's the competition.
As a trained pee teacher, and a kid who wanted
to play and do everything when I was younger. I
just love that element. Now I'm not a crazed compared
like my good mates Ricky Carmichael and Townsend Bell and
James Kin's Cliff, who will fight to the death over anything.
I'm not that bad, but I love the competition.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
Yeah right, Oh, I had never thought about that parallel
specifically of you know, in the moment you have to
make a split second decision as an athlete broadcaster and
then have that immediate reaction or adjustment or oh I
got chills. That was really really cool. Do you think
that when you're talking about that moment, do you feel
(24:34):
that there's a different way to build up that excitement
or to that that moment is experienced if it's a
short sprint type of sport versus a longer endurance.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
Well, that's a really good question, and if it's okay,
there's two answers, and two legitimate answers with a seller
right with a sprint race, so stay For instance, during
this football season, you heard a lot of my voice.
SENBC used a lot of my voice on promos for
Shaiki richardson the one hundred meter World women's world champion.
(25:07):
You know, I work with Ado Bolden, Olympic legend Sonya
Richards Ross. Our track and field team is amazing. But
on the on the short sprints, I work with Ado Bolden,
who's a two four time Olympic medalist, two silvers, two bronze.
And so what will happen is before the race, Ato
and I do a lot of like back and forth,
give and go. You know, he's Julie Lennow his lead
defeat here, and you give a little background as you're
(25:29):
going through the lain ideas like that. But once the
gun goes off, you know, I'll always pause, peop, want
to hear the gun, and then I'm into it and it's,
you know, ten seconds, eleven seconds, man less than ten seconds,
it's it's over and done with boom. And so you've
done a bit of that story set up there and
then it comes to that, to that peak and that
natural crescendo of course at the finish with a NASCAR
(25:50):
race or an IndyCar race or twenty four hours at Daytona.
The roll for Daytona, it's more like a golf tournament
where you've got that rolling story for a lot longer
but you've got to take the pieces of that story,
retell it, remind people. Maybe people went with you for
the first half of the broadcast or whatever, people tune
(26:10):
in and tune out. You've got to go back and
you've got to gather up all those pieces, which there
are more pieces than they were in the women's one
hundred meter World final. You've got to gather all those
pieces up and bring it back and still bring it
to a crescendo. But it might not be as crazy
as calling a one hundred meter final. But two great,
two exciting finishes, two ways to tell a story, but
(26:32):
just two different ways.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Yeah no, and thank you for walking through that because
having absolutely no broadcast experience. A question that I had was,
in longer races or events, do you instinctively know win
to talk and when to let it be silent? And
is that different in different sports or is just kind
of the gut feeling or do you have someone telling
you all right, is there any producer in the booth
(26:55):
who's guiding as well?
Speaker 2 (26:59):
Well, we don't have a during the booth per se
our producer, so on oh our headsets on? You can
talk to that, you talk to the truck and then
these days there's quite a bit of and it's not
just on NBC, it's cross all networks. Is quite a
bit of remote production. So say, for instance, when we
did the roll X twenty four at Daytona. The I
(27:19):
Wheather Tech Sportscar Championship is a NASCAR owned property and
the production comes out even though it airs on NBC,
it is produced out of NASCAR productions in Charlotte, North Carolina,
or Concord, North Carolina, and so our entire so the
collaboration of NBC people and NASCAR production stuff. They're in
North Carolina. Myself, Calvin Fish, Townsend Bell, James Hinchketh Hinch
(27:44):
was driving. But you know, everybody, Jeff Burton, Steve Latart,
Weather this year, everybody is on site at Daytona. So
when we're talking, when we're hitting the button and talking
to our producer, they're up in North Carolina. But to
your point, it's to blend. Everybody has their job to
do and then everybody it has to come together. It's
(28:05):
like a symphony. You know, the producer is the conductor
and everybody's got to come together. All those musical instruments
got to come together. So it sounds good. Sometimes they'll
say layout and layout means zip it right, let's have
a listen to the cars, or they'll say or they'll
they'll say layout, Marty Schnyder is coming in or whatever.
It's like this, give and go, push and pull. The
(28:28):
director has taking care of the pictures, the producer takes
care of the storylines. But for as long as all
of us have been doing it, we know as well,
and if we're talking a little bit too much, we
certainly hear about it from the boss. So it's kind
of the answer is all of the above.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Yeah, and that makes sense. And is it tough to
be talking and then hearing something in your ear and
getting that feedback? If there is that overlap.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
For me, it's not because I've been doing it for
so long, but I do see when when new people
come into the booth or whatever you can tell it,
it jolts them because they're like, you have to almost
just let it soak in. And it's only time that
that gets you used to it, you know, because you
can hear it, and as you're delivering it, you've got
(29:17):
to you know, you got to focus to get your
words out. Meanwhile, this is coming in and somehow it's
absorbing it. And then I'll finish my sentence and we'll say,
and Julie has more and I don't even I don't
even remember half the time that they say Julie's up
next whatever. It just goes in and we spit it out.
You know. Sometimes sometimes you forget to be honest, sometimes
(29:39):
you do forget. Like they might be saying, you know,
I'm thinking, in my head, is it Marty Snyder or
Kevin Lee? I can't remember, so I hit the talk
back who is it? They'll be like, Kevin, all right,
here's Kevin Lee. You know. Yeah, And you do that
because you can't take it all in. But contrary to
what people people think, which we get told this all
the time, people think that during an IndyCar race or
(30:02):
the Rolex twenty four or something that goes on for
hours and hours and hours, that we're reading a script.
I just want to let it, just want to let
everybody know there is no script for a live event.
Yeah happening. We're seeing it when you're seeing it, so
there is no script. So we're not reading a script.
And also the producer can't speak that fast, and we
(30:22):
can't take it in that fast that the producers telling
us what to say. So that's what we get paid
for as commentators.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yeah, which honestly brings up kind of another even parallel
between racers and broadcasters. Is this idea that you will
have someone like unprompted talking in your ear. For us,
it's a spotters or you know, the team whoever, and
you have you can't let that mess you up. And
I know, like you know talking, you have to talk
with your spot to make sure like, hey, okay, it's
going to distract me if you're talk in the middle
(30:49):
of the turn, try to keep it on the straightaways
or something like that. But if you need to get information,
like you have to be ready to not get distracted.
So oh, so many parallels in.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
How a lot of parallels.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, that is so cool. We're going to take one
more quick break, but then we'll be right back with Lee.
We are back with Lee, And if I'm honest with
Julia Landauer, I want to dive in a little more
into the prep for broadcasting and kind of twofold one.
(31:23):
When you get told, okay, we want you to comment
on track and field if you had not watched that
sport before, or been intimately familiar with it. What does
that kind of research and onboarding into being knowledgeable about
a sport look like.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
I'm fanatical about watching type as they say, So I
will go back and I'll just make this up that
pulled me in to do this particular track and field mat.
And there's already been seven track and field mats this year.
I will go back and watch all seven of those mates,
and I will watch every event and I will log.
(32:01):
I will log it like, note, take this is what
happened and Heat one of the women's fifteen hundred, Heat
two of the fifteen hundred, and it'll be like this
person made this past and so I'll have my own
notes watching going back and watching that, or it could
be simple as that event from the previous year. I'll
go back and watch it and make really specific notes.
(32:22):
Then you have our research department, which is just incredible
at NBC Sports, especially the Olympic Research Department, and they
gather everything possible. Now that's great that they gather it.
The hard part is you have to read it it all,
you have to ingest it all, you have to read it,
(32:44):
soak it in, make your own notes off to the side,
and you know for good or for bad. It's kind
of like taking in this much stuff to maybe use
this much stuff. But you have to do that because
safe For instance, in June we have the US Track
(33:04):
and Field US Olympic Track and Field Team Trials. There's
lots of events because there's so many competitors and you
don't know who is going to make it or who
isn't going to make it. You've got your favorites for sure,
but then there's surprises, so you have to make sure
that you've studied pretty much everybody because if somebody is
(33:24):
a surprise winner, you better not be left shorthanded, right,
So you've got to have something to say on everybody.
So trying to think of giving you a succinct answer,
it's watching tape, it's reading what the research department come
up with. It's it's additional stuff. Our team that I
work with on track and field are incredible because the
majority of them are former athletes, they are Olympians, they're
(33:45):
world champions. They're incredible in the contacts that they have
in the sport. We do have lots of production meetings.
It's nobody's left behind, so to speak, Like it's all
in NBC makes it incredible for you to have. It's
almost like Team Penske if you wish that Roger Penske's
going to make sure his drivers have the best people
(34:08):
and the best equipment so you don't and the best
testing and the best you know, sim stuff and the
best whatever so that when it comes time to race,
there's no excuses. You can't say, oh, I didn't have
this or I didn't have that. And it's the same
with NBC. They make sure you have everything you need,
so it's up to you to do your homework and
then go and do your job.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
Yeah, so would the research department be responsible for giving
you like technical elements of a sport. So like I'm
thinking with track and field, I'm sure that there are
technical ways that they land when they're running on their
feet or like a certain.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
I don't know well enough to that's that's more out.
That's more for our analysts. That's more for our experts.
Will they will do certainly do rules, rules and regulations,
historical statistics, and then anything where they're really good is
controversial things, And in track and field there's a lot
of controversy because of athletes failing drug tests. Et cetera.
(35:07):
We've gone through the last few years the highly controversial
topic of shoes, you know, super shoes with the carbon
plates and the shoes and things like that. And so
where our research department is incredible is in the correct wording,
the correct phraseology, and how to handle it. We have, sadly,
(35:28):
in the last twelve months, we've had some deaths in
the sport, most notably Tory Bouie. And you know, we
all commentated on toy and you know, some of the
ladies I work with competed with her, and you know
it's devastating. I've commentated on her, and so you have
(35:49):
to handle that in the appropriate manner. And that's where
our research department come in with historical contexts, real real
skill at being appropriately, appropriately sensitive and right words at
(36:09):
the right time. And now not always are they fed
to us like well as adults. You have to you
have to do that. I mean, I've had to do
it so many times in motorsports, sadly, where you know,
commentating on career ending crashes and sometimes life ending crashes
and that has not been fun. And there's nobody telling
you what to say. You're on your own and you
have to find the right words at the right time.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
As you're processing everything, and you're also human, and I
would assume that there's some more interpersonal relationship that you
develop with a lot of these athletes. And so do
you in those moments, do you feel like you're able
to console the family? And I'm sure it's case by case,
but do you feel like like kind of job aside,
(36:53):
you're able to kind of be with the family or
some condolence. Is that way beyond just over the broadcast?
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Yeah, I think I think you have to. I think
it's in the words that you choose, sotoling the family
or comforting the family rather, I think the words that
you choose maybe the helpful ones. But sometimes, I mean
it's just difficult. I mean I was in I was
in the chair when Justin Wilson, you know, I vividly
remember to this day saying and Wilson into the wall
(37:21):
and that was that was the crash that you know,
that was when Justin passed away. David Hobb, Steve Matchett,
Will Buston and myself we were on the air when
when Juel b Yankee was you know, ultimately he was
killed in that moment, he was kept on life support
for several weeks afterwards, but he was killed in Japan
in that crash with the crane. You know, there's there's
been numerous crashes. I was commentating for Robert Wickens at
(37:46):
Pocono and we were we were, you know, waiting for
and it was certainly more than an hour, maybe close
to two hours where we didn't know if Robbie was
was with us or not. There's been many many in
bikes and cars, and it's it's really tough and you
just have to that's where you forget the job. Yeah,
it's human to human and you just because quite often
(38:10):
to your point, the broadcast is the famili's conduit to
any news. Yeah, sometimes the families there, but often they're
not an extended family. They're relying on us to give
them an update. And yeah, a big burden of responsibility
and and you well, boy, there's nothing that there's nothing
(38:30):
that makes you find the right words at the right
time and then something like that.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
Yeah, and it's it's I mean, it's so impressive because
like a lot of times, words will just escape. And
obviously you're a professional and so words are what you do.
But yeah, I mean I remember I was in my
college dorm as a sophomore when Dan Weldon passed, and
like that was the first and I've been racing since
I was ten, and so that was the first race
that I was watching live where there was the this fatality.
(39:02):
And I clearly remember feeling the emotion of the broadcasters
or well, I don't remember if you were there or not,
but reporting on that one. But you need that human
connectivity almost in those moments, and it's kudos to all
the broadcasters that that have to do that. Switching gears
a little bit still to that preparation work. Can we
(39:24):
get a little granular about like the week of right,
so let's say you're commentating on an IndyCar race or
a let's do the twenty four hours of Daytona, because
they have all the build up with the roar before
twenty four all of that. But when you get to
the like Monday before the Saturday start of that race,
what does the week look like or the prep or
is it what does that look like?
Speaker 2 (39:46):
Well prep has changed a lot because of these things. Right, h.
So once upon a time, once upon a time, you
would get press releases on a fax machine. True, there
was no social media, and there was no Internet, and
then now with social media we probably people like you
(40:07):
and me and sports people all over the world. You
don't even think about how much you're absorbing on a
daily basis simply by the accounts that you follow. So
there's that, but that's fun. We follow that for fun,
but it's also very informative, whether it be team based
news or driver based news, and drivers and athletes totally
(40:29):
because it's their own they will stay a lot more
than what they will in a press release or a
news conference or whatever it might be. So I mean,
that's an easy one, so hit that one up. Then
there's interviews that maybe the governing body arrangers. So imps
are very good about doing driver zooms, and they'll do
(40:51):
it by team, so it might be okay on Monday
that such and such whatever it's Vasa Sullivan Lexus, and
they'll have all six of their drivers of al to
the media. So the media you can do that, and
that's good one on one time. Then outside of that,
you've got your own personal relationships simply calling team owners
or calling drivers. We then have an Inser, an inser
(41:15):
research team which also do NASCAR. It's the same group
of guys out of North Carolina who do NASCAR as well,
and they do inso also where they will provide it's
more it's more statistically based information. But then it's all
of the team and driver bios. So you've got that
(41:37):
to go through to make sure. For years, Calvin Fish
and Brian Till and myself we've been making our own books.
So we will have a book about that thick. I'll
go down the road to the local UPS store and
I get it bound and that's kind of like my
bible for the week. In there is historical statistics, all
of the teams, the bios. It's a page two pages
(41:59):
per team. It's got everything on there that you need.
It's got just anything and everything that I need for
the week, scheduling, you know, meetings, this, that and the other,
any historical kind of notes that I need. And then
it's time on the ground, which is so that's all
of the pre stuff. But once you get on the
(42:21):
ground at Daytona, then you hit the ground running and
the garage area. The paddock is the beast. It's like
a buffet of stories, right, so you've got to get
in there and try and get something from every team,
and that's where again, it might be in a press release,
might be at a news conference, you'll find something out
by the front tire changer or the refueler will tell
(42:41):
you something. Then you get to the drivers, or the
driver's wife or a girlfriend, or you'll see one of
the parents or whatever it might be, the engineer will
tell you something. And so you've just got to make
sure you get all of those down. And you may
never use it, but you might because that team or
that driver might be doing well and you'll be like, hey,
I've got a pretty good little one here. He scored
(43:02):
a hole in one at LPGA National earlier this week
playing with his grandfather who'd never been to the roll
twenty four at Daytona. You know all those crazy little
side stories. So the long way around the roundabout to
your question, Julie, is everything and anything. It all goes
into the hopper and you've got to know when to
(43:23):
pull it out. So that that's the granular is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
It's every bloody day. It's as much as you can
file into this.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
Yeah, tixel a lot of endurance and stamina, I'm sure,
so do you have any pre broadcast rituals.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
I will always wear the same clean but the same
kind of socks. I was going to say, really, I
was going to say, I was going to say, I
always wear the same kind of socks. I will always
wear makes.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
It feel better. I didn't think that you didn't wash
your socks, because for anyone.
Speaker 2 (43:58):
My favorite, I'll always wear blacks socks always, and I
always have to have like a Friday Saturday Sunday, like
my race weekend socks, and that goes for track and field,
or if I was doing golf, it would be Thursday, Friday,
Saturday Sunday. But always wear black socks and the socks
dejure at the moment a foot joy socks for joy
anklet socks because they're so comfortable. And so I think
(44:22):
maybe that might be the only free broadcast routine or
or that's pretty significant. That takes planning. That sucks. I
don't know, No, I don't, I mean, you know, I
make sure I make sure always before we go on air,
like always give give the guys like a fist pump
or a pat on the back, and we always like
get each other pumped up, just we always wish wish
(44:45):
each other a good show. It's like a driver wishing
you know the crew or the driver saying to the crew,
chief of the team, it's a good one. Like we
always pump each other up. There's no yeah, there's no
there's no food or meal or or any anything fine
anything funny like that. Uh, that's okay. Always. I always
wear the same, always wear the same risk things. I
(45:07):
have two things on my wrist and one of them
is a is a hard like a hard bracelet, and
that says dream, believe, achieve. So I always have that
on I love that I have. I have a I
do have one free broadcast ritual or a broadcast ritual
when I do the Indy five hundred. My dad passed
away a long time ago and never got to see
(45:27):
me call the Olympics, saw the Indy five hundred, and
so I my dad had a favorite ring on his
right hand. So I always wear if you ever, if
you ever take a close look at me at the
Indy five hundred, if I'm wearing if I'm holding the
microphone in my right hand, I'll wear it. And I
never wear a ring on my right hand. I'll have
I'll have a silver ring on my right hand that's
my dad's and I only wear it at the Indy
(45:48):
five hundred.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
I'll go back and look for that because that's a
really beautiful tribute. That's really nice. So last question or
no second, last question before we get into if you're honest,
but do you still get at all nervous or butterflies
or a certain Jinisa Kwai and your guy before a broadcast.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Don't get nervous at all. It's more performance based. You
want to do a good job like you want to
so it's more getting revved up. It's not nervous. I
love my job, so therefore that's you know, I think
you get on edge, and that being on edge is
(46:29):
different to nervous. I think if you don't have, if
you if you don't have a good comfort level in
what you're doing, that would be nerves. Probably the last time,
probably the last time I can ever experience having some
kind of nerves was a couple of years ago when
we were doing the Winter Olympics and we came straight
(46:51):
off the back of the super Bowl and it was
a new category of bob sledd. It was called monobob
for women only, so it's the two person Bob Slade,
but one female athlete in there, and we were doing
the final run. It was the fourth and final run,
and Mike Tariko had finished, you know, NBC Sports had
finished the Super Bowl, and Mike threw to me and
(47:12):
we took it from there for the final ten athletes,
and thank goodness, Team USA got gold and silver and
it was the only medals at the sliding center in
the Beijing Games for Team USA. And we had we
knew it was going to be a big audience and
it turned it turned out there was thirty million people
for that half an hour commercial three and I knew
(47:35):
it was going to be a big audience. And so
again it wasn't nerves, but it was anxiousness to say,
we've got to like, got to do a good job
for the network. It just got to do a good
job for the network. So that was the last time
I can ever really remember like feeling a little bit
anxious just to make sure it was good, and especially
when it was funneling down to the team last two
(47:59):
Team USA lids and then the women end up getting
gold and silver, which is just an awesome story totally.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
That's an interesting distinction though that nervousness would imply feeling
not like quite there from a craft perspective or a
training a perspective, whereas like the edge or I think anxiety,
like that little bit of anxiousness or anxiety is one.
But I hadn't really thought about that distinction because I've
(48:26):
always said if you're not a little nervous, then you
don't or being a little nervous shows that you care.
But I do like that specificity in that distinction. I will, yeah,
I might, I might adopt that moving forward. So last
question for you before the rapid fire. Is there a
sport that you have not yet been able to comment
on that you would.
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Like to As a kid I played. This doesn't mean
anything to the North American audience, maybe maybe maybe some
of your viewers a little bit. Is a f L,
which is Aussie rules football. And so when the Grand
Final happens, which is like the super Bowl for Australian football,
(49:06):
it's at the MCG, the Melbourne Cricket Ground. There's one
hundred and ten thousand people there. It's massive. And I
played AFL, or played Aussie Rules football as a kid,
and no people involve love it still follow my favorite team,
which is Carlton, and it's a fast flowing game and
I never ever have had the opportunity to commentate that,
(49:29):
and it's probably a bit the opportunity or the moment
has moved on by I think it's probably too late
for that. But I always thought that I may have
made a pretty decent footy commentator just because of the
fast flowing nature of it. You know, I love I
love the variety that I've had in my career, you know,
(49:51):
everything from golf to sailing, to all the motorsports stuff,
to track and field to rowing at the real Olympics.
You know, NBC has been a to me to throw
the range of opportunities my way and to rugby. You know,
I've commentated collegiate rugby to World seven's to you know everything.
(50:12):
So it's been a it's been a it's been a
really fun ride.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Well, they know what they're doing because, as we've talked about,
you carry that natural enthusiasm and like are so so
engaging to listen to. And I've, like, you know, from
the whole from as long as I've seen you on TV,
I have appreciated that and so thank you and you're
really phenomenal at what you do, so keep it up
because we love it.
Speaker 2 (50:34):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
So jumping into if you were honest rapid fire, what
is your favorite place that you've ever lived?
Speaker 2 (50:41):
Favorite place I've ever lived was on the beach in
Sydney Queenscliffe, Sydney, lived on the headland and instead of
looking at the ocean coming towards you, my wife and
I lived on the headland, on the rocky headland, so
the waves came around this peninsula. So we would sit
out on now balcony and watch the waves go left
(51:02):
to right. So we'd sit out on the balcony, have
a gin and tonic on sunset and have some little
cheese and crackers between us and watch the waves go
this way. And the beach went all the way down
that way, down south to Manly. So that was on
Sydney's northern beaches. It was spectacular.
Speaker 1 (51:18):
That sounds absolutely divine and I don't think I've ever
watched the waves.
Speaker 2 (51:22):
Go yeah, right, yeah, it's pretty It's pretty different.
Speaker 1 (51:25):
You ever thought about that? Yeah, that is so cool.
What Summer Olympics sport are you most looking forward to
watching this year?
Speaker 2 (51:33):
The one that I'm working on track and field.
Speaker 1 (51:34):
There we go, There we go. Silly question. When you're
watching sports for fun, do you note to yourself how
the commentators are doing or can you fuck it out?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
No? I don't. That to me is not it's not
fair on them. If I if I'm watching, I'm watching
for the sport. I'm not listening to them because you know,
I know many of people do that to me, and
you know I don't enjoy it. You know, like there's
enough critics out there. They don't need me. They don't
(52:07):
need me to be a critic as well. I love
and I when I do any kind of media training
or anything like that, or I get asked by young
broadcasters or young journalists or whatever, I encourage them to
do what I do. And I try and watch as
many different sports as I can, even if I don't
really I'm not really into that sport. I like to
(52:30):
watch it to hear how hear and see how they
present it and how they storytell. And there's something out
there for all of us. Because you know, if you
get stuck in your groove or stuck in a rut,
that's not very appealing. Being inflexible is not very appealing.
We can learn we can all learn from others about
(52:51):
how you speak, how you present, how you know the
rise and fall in your voice, the humor, the interaction
with your on air colleagues, the interaction with the athletes,
interviewing techniques, sending, receiving. There's so much to be learned.
And I just think everybody. You know, there's an old
song from a British band called Gruva Marta, and one
(53:15):
of the lyrics says, if everybody looked the same, we'd
be tired of looking at each other, right, So difference
is the key. And so just to see what people
are doing on NBA at the moment, to see what golf,
the golf teams are doing, whether it's on NBC Sports
or the Golf Channel, or it's on CBS. You know,
watch the Masters a couple of weekends ago to watching
(53:35):
you know football, we all watch football, whatever it might be.
I just love listening to see how they're doing it.
You know, it's not up to me to grade them.
Speaker 1 (53:44):
That's a really fantastic perspective. Last, if you're honest, what
is something that you're grateful for right now?
Speaker 2 (53:51):
My family, my wife and I have two terrific boys.
They're fifteen and thirteen. They they've always been very open
minded with everything from travel to food to meeting people,
and we just took them. They had their spring break
and they came to Foxborough in Massachusetts to monstrategy Supercross
(54:13):
with me, and then we took them straight out to
the West Coast for Long Beach for the MS Indycardal
Better and you know, they got to meet everybody. One weekend,
they're hanging out with Ricky Carmichael. The next weekend they're
meeting Mario Andretti, and they met a bunch of different people.
They went into the Ganassi Hauller and met Scott Dixon
on the weekend that he had that most improbable victory.
So I'm most thankful, most grateful for my family because
(54:37):
as a dad and a husband, I'm a why a
lot and they're super understanding. My wife and kids are
super understanding too for me to be a traveling, working dad,
and you know, I just make sure that when I'm home,
i'm present, I'm here because i know that I'm going
to be gone, you know, in the next few days
to wherever it is next. So I'm very grateful for
(54:58):
my family.
Speaker 1 (54:59):
Yeah, that's great and I'm sure that they see your
enthusiasm for what you're doing and what I assume would
be enthusiasm for life as well, and that's got to
be infectious and inspiring and kind of makes it all worthwhile.
So yeah, thank you for sharing that. Also, I got
to meet Scott Dixon at the SPS one year. I
was like, oh my gosh, look we're meeting racing royalty.
(55:20):
That is so cool.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
A humble hero he.
Speaker 1 (55:24):
Is, like, oh my goodness, yeah so much them was like, people,
do you realize who was sitting right there? Like it
was incredible. I know that racing is not the most
watched sport everywhere compared to like NBA and stuff, but yeah, no,
it was really incredible just to see his presence in
that moment. And now that we have manifested you commentating
(55:44):
on the AFL, I hope that that's in your future
and that's amazing. So Lee, where can people find you
online if they would like to follow you.
Speaker 2 (55:52):
And hear more from that? Just simply on Twitter and
on Instagram at Lee Diffy And it's spelt like a
girl l e I g h at l e i
g h d i f f e y.
Speaker 1 (56:06):
I had never thought about the gendered spelling of Lee.
But you know what I know. I went to middle
school with a girl who spelled her name l e E.
Speaker 2 (56:14):
That's right, all parents her name l e E. Yeah.
I asked my parents the same, and they said, well,
it didn't matter if you were going to be a
boy or girl. It's it's you can use it both ways.
And I'm like, yeah, okay, no worries. Well I'm still
when I check in the hotels or whatever, it says
welcome miss Lee diffee, I get, I get, I get mail,
(56:34):
I get mail, it says miss or missus Lee Deffe.
So I'm used to it by now. When I was
a kid, here's a story that Dario, Frank Kitty and
Alan McNish and those guys just love that. And I
think Calvin Fish told them this, so they always bring
it up. But when I was a kid, I think
I was ten years old and in Australia, and I
(56:55):
want a competition, I want a bicycle, and based on
the spelling of my name, they sent me a girls bot.
Speaker 1 (57:01):
No way, Hey, character building.
Speaker 2 (57:03):
Right, Hey, this is cold if I'm honest. So I
was just honest and told you that story.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
I love that you leaned into the theme of this podcast.
Thank you so much. Lee spelled L E I g H,
but not girls. Lee, No, this was incredible. Thank you
so much for joining me. I really appreciate your insights
into everything that we discussed. Everyone that is our show.
Thank you so much. If you enjoyed this episode, please
share it with a friend, and as always, thank you
for letting us be honest with you and I look
(57:28):
forward to seeing you next week.
Hello everybody, and welcome back to another episode of If
I'm Honest with Julia Landauer. If you have ever watched
motorsports or the Olympics, you have probably heard Lee Diffy
as a broadcaster or a commentator on those events. And
let me tell you, I am pretty pumped to share
that he is our guest on this week's episode of
If I'm Honest. So Lee Diffy has been in TV
(00:26):
sports broadcasting for over twenty five years. He's originally from Australia,
got his start in motorcycles and supercross and that discipline.
He's worked in network TV sports on three different continents,
in Australia, in the UK and Europe, and in North America.
He has called more categories of high level motorsport on
network TV than anyone else in the world. Paris will
(00:49):
be his sixth Olympic Games, with three Winter games and
Paris being the third Summer game. He's the first foreign
voice played by a play person, to call the Indy
five hundred to the US audience, to call a NASCAR
Cup Rice to a US audience, and to call the
Olympics for NBC Sports. He is someone who I have
seen on TV for decades now, and something that is
(01:10):
always so cool to listen to is that he brings
this incredible enthusiasm to his commentating, and he is naturally
very curious and disciplined and thorough in his preparation, and
he appreciates the art of sport and capturing the intensity
of that moment where you're either winning or you're failing,
(01:31):
or whatever it is. And this conversation was really cool,
partially because I felt like I was fangirling a little bit,
and it was kind of like getting to chat with
someone you've always looked up to and admired, and I
think he does so much for the sport of auto
racing that it was really cool to be able to
have this one on one and we talk about everything
(01:52):
from his roots and how he got into commentating. He
was originally a pe teacher. We get into what brought
him to the UK and the leaps of faith that
he took throughout his career. We talk about what innate
traits he has to his personality that have helped him.
We talk about the adrenaline of telling a story in
(02:13):
front of a live audience, the adrenaline of being able
to watch sports live, and we get into some nitty
gritty stuff about how you put on a broadcast and
what goes into the preparation, and how he's learned really
intimate details about different sports that he may not have
known much about before. So it was really exciting. It
(02:34):
was really interesting as one performer to another. In a sense,
we found a lot of similarities between broadcasting and this
live audience storytelling and actually being in the car and racing.
It was a really interesting discussion. I am so grateful
that Lee took the time out of his busy traveling
schedule to sit down with me and to chat, and
(02:56):
he kept it really honest, and I really appreciate that.
I hope that you enjoy this episode. Lee, thank you
so much for joining me on If I'm honest with
Julia Landauer.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Hey, it's good to be on here.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Finally, finally, No, this is so cool because for our listeners,
we've been following each other on Twitter. I'm a big fan.
I've been watching you for years, and so this is
just really cool, especially as two people who do different
types of storytelling. I would say I'm really excited to
get into some of your techniques and just some of
your background, and thank you again for joining me. So
(03:31):
to get started, I learned this recently. So you actually
got started as a competitor in motor sports on motorcycles,
is that correct?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Yeah, just as a kid. You know, I had my
first motorcycle when I was six years old, and my
dad was really into motorcycle racing for whatever reason. My
grandfather raced and rode bikes and so race off road
motorcycles on the road, but wouldn't let my father do
(03:59):
it a figure, so kind of my dad lived vicariously
through my brother and myself, and so motorcycles were our life,
you know, like for other kids in the neighborhood they
played football or cricket or tennis or something like that. Well,
the diffies were the motorsport people, the motorbike people. So
and you know, growing up in the seventies and eighties,
(04:21):
that was pretty weird like that. We definitely stood it out.
That wasn't the norm. You know, people didn't understand it.
And certainly motorcycles weren't in the mainstream like now where
you see with X games or Monstrategy, Supercross Pro Motocross
SMX World Championships. The exposure that the sport gets now,
it didn't have back then, so to say that you
(04:42):
did motorcycle racing as your sport was really quite odd
at the time.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Yeah, no, that makes sense. So then I have to
ask because of what I read and tell me if
this is wrong, but that when you were elite teenager
you got kind of got started in your commentating career
with motorcycles. So is that accurate?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
Also pretty close?
Speaker 1 (04:59):
I was.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I was at university and I had stopped writing, focused
on school, tried to do a little bit better, and
I ended up going to university to study education to
be a pe teacher. And the local motorcycle club that
my brother was still riding at and a lot of
my mates were still racing at. I had made speeches
(05:23):
on behalf of my brother and the local motorcycle club
just said, hey, you're pretty confident for a young guy
behind a microphone. We need a public address announcer and
we'll give you sixty dollars And I sat in the
Queensland Sun all day. But for me, it came naturally
because I knew the competitors and that was at a
(05:44):
track that I used to race at, and so it
was a nice easy way of getting into it. I
didn't grow up wanting to be a sports broadcaster or
a motorsport announcer or whatever. It was one of those
stories where I literally fell into it.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Well, it's also pretty cool that you got paid on
your first gig. I feel like so many creatives have
to volunteer their time for their first stuff to prove themselves.
So that's I mean, that's pretty great. That's a great deal.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
Hey, when you're at university or college, sixty bucks is
sixty bucks I toil get.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Yeah, it's something to work as well. I mean, like
I when I gave my first paid keynote address, and
it was right out of college, and you know, they
I had given a ted X talk, so I knew
I had this polished video that somewhat you know, gave
me some credibility. But they asked me, okay, cool, we'd
love to hire you. What's your fee? And that was
something where I had to do so much research and
(06:34):
I totally undervalued myself. But it was so cool to
just have that baseline to then build off of and
get smarter about that. So that was a Yeah, it's
an interesting way to start. So that's great. So then
so then did you did you go into any kind
of training or did you really just test the waters
and how you delivered your broadcasting. And obviously you said
(06:58):
that you have this relationship with the competitors, which brings
so much color to any kind of broadcaster announcing. But
it was it kind of just figure it out.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah, I just figured it out and listened to the
feed that feedback that my parents gave me and some
other friends and you know, friends' parents who were at
the race track or wherever that may have come from.
But the best form of feedback was that the way
that it grew was other clubs. So one of my
(07:30):
favorite stories that I didn't know until many years later,
was that the first place I ever did it was
at the Ipswich Motorcycle Club at a racetrack called Tivoli.
And about an hour from where that was our hour
and a half from where that was was Twimba and
there was a track called Eco Valley. Well, the most
famous racer from Tiwimba is the Indy five hundred winner
(07:51):
will Power, two time IndyCar champion well Lo and behold
the promoter that I worked for way back then at
Echo Valley. Will will Power's mum used to be his bookkeeper,
and yeah, just the small world story. So, you know,
I first did it at Tivoli, then I did it
at Echo Valley, and the people from another club in
(08:14):
northern New South Wales in Ballina, they heard me, and
so it kind of grew bit by bit by people saying, hey,
we heard you at Tivoli or we heard you in
Balaner and we heard you. And so to me, that
was pretty good feedback that I must have been doing
an okay job if they if they then asked me
to travel to wherever their club was to again, and
this is not radio, this is not television, This is
(08:36):
very you know, this is very basic, rudimentary public address
sitting in a wooden tower, one microphone, you know, a
transistor radio as the as the break entertainment. You just
stick the microphone up against the speaker of the radio.
And it was fairly bare bone stuff, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah, But but I feel like every every discipline like
that has unique styles and you know, unique ways that
you engage the audience and engage the crowd, and so
to be able to take such such bare bones tools
and do it well and clearly make a name for yourself,
and I feel like. It also emphasizes the point that,
especially when you're getting started, if you're passionate about something,
(09:18):
curious about something like, forget about the audience because it
might be small stars to start, but you never know
who might be there or how it can catch on.
And that's literally it worked out for you. So that's
really cool.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Yeah, I think the thing, I think the thing that
I discovered very early on, maybe even on the first day,
I can't remember, but I know, I know it was
very early on that I displayed genuine enthusiasm for what
I was seeing in front of me. So if there
was a pause, if somebody was going to make a
position or lose a position, or it was the last lap,
(09:53):
and my voice, you know, I went to you know,
went into an excited mode and tone, and then at
the same moment, because I'm sitting on the edge of
the grand stand, et cetera, I could see people's reaction.
And so that was the first time I ever remember
I remember not necessarily cause an effect, but maybe action reaction. Yeah,
(10:17):
you know, you know where where the tone and the
heightened sense of my voice actually impacted the crowd. And
so it was the first time I ever realized that
you could. You know, they talk about having the crowd
in the palm of your hand. I'm not sure it was.
I don't want to exaggerate. I'm not sure it was
that great, but it was. It was you could you
could understand how you could influence the crowd with your
(10:40):
excitement level, and that that was quite intoxicating.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Yeah, I mean, and that's that's such a good point.
It's interesting that like you got to like really very
clearly visibly see that because I feel like, you know,
as a as a viewer of any sport or any like,
any broadcast you do, you feed off of people's energy.
And it reminds me of the Winston Churchill quote where
(11:04):
he says success consists of going from failure to failure
without loss of enthusiasm, and just that that key that
being enthusiastic will give you motivation, confidence, it'll make other
people excited about what you're doing, and can confirm that
you continue to deliver that in your broadcast. And I
would assume, especially for any kind of viewer who might
(11:25):
be is a more casual fan of any given sport,
they can be hard to jump into and so kind
of taking cues from the commentators as to when something
really exciting is happening helps the viewer in their own
learning journey.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
So that's really cool, Yeah, very much. So I agree.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Yeah. So I'm always interested in when people make really
big moves. And obviously you're from Australia and you move
to the UK first and then to the US. So
can you walk through a little bit how that happened,
if it was an intentional decision on your part, if
it's somewhat kind of fell into your lap, and what
it was like moving so far away from home.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I wish I wish a lot more things fell into
my lap, that's for sure. But maybe I wouldn't have the.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
You got the big one, you got the big one, right?
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Maybe maybe Yeah, I wouldn't have the story that I have,
But I have a I have. I have kind of
a recurring story with different parts. But the part is,
you know, work really hard, make great contacts, cherish those contacts,
and be in the right place at the right time.
And so I got into television in Australia, not at
(12:34):
the local level, not at the regional level. I started
straight at the network level, which is highly unusual. But
it was again right time right place, and they had
a need for me. I got in through my commentary,
not as a journalist. I don't have a degree in
journalism or communications, so I openly admit I kind of
(12:56):
got into the network through the back door through my commentary,
and the head of sport at the time at Network
ten in Australia said, look, you're going to fill the
commentary role, great, but you need to learn more about
TV and sports television in general. So I'm going to
get you a job on the nightly sports show where
you can be a freelance reporter. So it's kind of
like ESPN Sports Center. It's a show that's no longer
(13:19):
around sadly in Australia called Sports Tonight, and it was
a really epic show. It was fantastic and it taught
me a lot. Taught me that the nuts and bolts
of television, and it exposed me to even though I
was a peach teacher played all kinds of sport as
a kid, it taught me a lot about I mean,
you could go in for an eight hour shift and
sit there and watch I have to log, you know,
(13:42):
CNN World Sports, and you could be going everything from
baseball to basketball, to Premier League soccer, to whatever it
might be, you know, whack it within whacky sports, or
you might sit there for an eight hour shift and
cover a cricket match and be logging, you know at
this time code such and such hit a for this time,
code such and such was caught out, you know, And
(14:03):
so it really just there was a lot of long,
long shifts. But I was working with these legendary television
people who hadn't only ever seen on TV, and I'm like,
what the hell am I doing in here? You know.
It was really it was really quite a trip. And
then things happened very fast for me. I was given
a lot of great opportunities and maximized on those. And
one of those opportunities was to travel overseas and do
(14:25):
some Formula one launchers and I met some terrific people,
kept their contacts and stayed in touch. And then through
one of the producers that I was working with in Australia,
had the opportunity to go to the twenty four Hours
of Lomont and to do a documentary. And that was
in the late nineteen nineties, in ninety eight and ninety nine,
(14:45):
and it was in the second year that we went
back to Lamont to do the same documentary. A dear
friend of mine now who back then was a colleague,
an older gentleman who I had worked with in television
for a little bit, and he was also another reporter
on this documentary. And he just said to me, he said,
what do you think of it over here? What do
you think about all this? And I thought he was
(15:06):
talking about Lomore in the event. We were standing in
the pit lane, and I just said, it's fantastic and
he said, no, I'm not talking about the race. I'm
talking about you over here in the Northern Hemisphere. And
I said what do you mean And he said, you
could make it over here, you could do it.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Oh, so were you just visiting for that?
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I was just yeah, yeah, I was still living in Australia.
And he said you could. He said you could do it,
and he said he said, live my dream for me,
and he said you could do it. And that was
in the June of nineteen ninety nine. And in January
of two thousand, I was living in London. Oh my goodness,
I left. I left, you know, I was only in
my twenties and I left an amazing job at Network ten,
(15:42):
I was doing V eight Supercars, I was doing IndyCar,
I was doing Moto GP, I was working on Sports Tonight,
and you know, for somebody's still in their twenties, it
was an amazing job. And I left and the network
couldn't believe that I left, and I didn't have a
job to go to in the UK. I really just
swung for the fences and through some really great friends
(16:02):
and contacts, I had a little bit of voiceover work.
But within a month, within a month of being in
the UK, I was interviewing with the BBC and got
a job to commentate the World Superbikes. So before before
my head could stop spinning, I was back on a
plane to Australia covering World Superbikes at Phillip Island. That
I was in South Africa, then I was in Japan
(16:22):
and it was an amazing will Wind Wind journey for sure.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Yeah, yeah, that's impressive. So then, so digging into kind
of your mindset a little bit more like when you
you know, you have this great setup at home, and
you obviously really impactful trips over to the UK, but
what would you say you were naturally curious and wanting
to expand your world. And you know, when you were little,
(16:49):
did you think you might want to get out of
Australia or is it just let's see, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Not at all. I just I grew up in suburban
Brisbane in a very blue collar family, and you know,
mum and dad were just regular people and my dad
was a painter and a sign writer. My mum was
a teacher THEYD and you know, living the life we
did in pretty humble surrounds and having the motorbikes, that
(17:19):
was pretty good. We thought life was great. We thought
life was great at that and then when this commentary
thing came along and that started opening my eyes to
different opportunities. And then I just I don't know why,
because my mum and dad were quite shy people, and
so I don't know why, but I was always I
(17:40):
was gifted with I don't want to say in abundance,
but enough self belief that I believed I could do
as good as or better than that next person. And
so maybe sometimes falsely believing that, I don't know, but
I backed myself. I always backed myself and maybe sometimes
(18:01):
embarrassed myself. I don't know, but I didn't care because
I was going to have a go, and my dad,
particularly my dad. My mum and my dad always, but
my dad, that was one of his sayings and it's
a very odsy thing to say, is have a go,
which means just try right and have a go, mate,
is what people say. And I was determined just to
have a go and whatever that was or whatever it
(18:23):
looked like, I was going to have a go. So
I left my childhood home, left mom and dad and
went to Sydney to swing for the fences, to have
a go. And I didn't have anything to go to
and had some great people supporting me. But I was
doing substitute school teaching. I was just baking carrot cakes
and selling them to the local cafe for my gas money.
(18:45):
I was doing whatever I needed to do to be
in knee number one spot in Australian media, to get
that opportunity. And so once I made that commitment to myself,
I was going to do whatever it took.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I absolutely love that. And I feel like, you know,
the more that every person can kind of embrace that,
like what's the worst that can happen, or more proactively
like I will figure this out. I can do this.
I think there's a lot of undervaluing ourselves or you know,
other people undervaluing themselves in a way that you know,
(19:20):
usually we're getting in our own way. So that is
just so uplifting and inspiring. I was getting goosebooks. Thank you.
We're going to take a quick break, but we will
be right back with Lee Diffy on if I'm honest
with Julia Landauer. We are back on if I'm honest
with Julia Landauer with our guest Lee Diffy. So I
(19:41):
get a lot of adrenaline when I get on stage,
and like, I'm sure you can appreciate like the high
of engaging an audience as you talked about, and you know,
making people have these reactions that you know or a
direct result of what you have done. Can I assume
that you still get some kind of highlight that when
you're in the broadcast booth.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Oh yeah, for sure, for sure, because it's it's everything
all into the into the pot. It's, uh, you know,
we're we're we are armed with being good storytellers, you know,
delivering the facts, doing people's athletic performance justice and they're
(20:20):
having fun right with each other, enjoying it yourself, but
enjoying being with your teammates. And that could be whether
I'm doing the the Olympics, the Track and Field World Championships,
or it could be doing IndyCar, whatever I'm working on.
You know, I make sure that all of the teams
that I'm a part of is that we get on
off air. So we get on on air, and when
(20:43):
you're all on the same level and you're all you
all feel like the show's going great and everybody's everybody's
right at their level, it's it's it's it's terrific because
you hope, I mean, we get more immediate feedback now
social media. You know, the old yardstick was the ratings,
(21:05):
which it still is, but you know, your superior is
what they tell you. But you know, you get feedback,
whether it be positive or negative on social media, and
we know with pretty much immediacy whether the audience is
enjoying it or not. And so we try and not try.
We do enjoy what we're doing, and we try to
(21:26):
make it so easy to consume for the viewer to
have fun as well, because if we're having fun, we
hope that they're having fun.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Yeah, no, that makes total sense. And you had mentioned that,
you know, you you naturally bring an engage in enthusiastic
kind of tone to your broadcasting. Do you find that
you are naturally a fan of most sports or is
it the competition that just you can figure out what's
exciting about? Because you commented on you know, as you said,
(21:55):
track and field, Olympics, racing, like all kinds of racing.
Like do you just love all the sports?
Speaker 2 (22:00):
I love sports, and I love them. I love the
competitive angle, but I love the moment, right, So what
is the moment? What? What? What is it about that
moment that defines winning or losing, scoring that touchdown, making
the part whatever it might be, you know, making that
perfect run down the down the mountain, in the bottle sled.
(22:21):
What what is it to me? It's that I see
a lot of what we do in live television in
the athlete. And when athletes come off whatever field it
is and come into my world and into our world,
they conquer and they agree with that and they they
sometimes I don't even ask them that, I just can
tell by the way they speak. And what that is
(22:43):
is split second decisions with no do overs. Mm hmmm.
And that's what we have. We can't delete the paragraph.
We can't we can't erase it and go over. I
didn't really like the sound they got that. And when
people give us a hard time sometimes on the broadcast,
you know, I would almost beg that they think about that,
because in life, we're humans. We're going to make mistakes.
(23:05):
I'm going to say every word that correctly that I
want to say to you on this podcast, and that's
okay because we're human. But in the height and heat
of a live sports broadcast, you know, we don't have
any doovers, and it's split second decision making and the
connection between this and this has to be has to
be really good. And I see that in athletes, whether
(23:27):
it's drivers, you know, do I make a move, Do
I break a little bit deeper here? Do I go in?
Do I hit him just a little bit? Do I
do this? Or track and field do I kick? You know,
it's on the last lap, I'm on the last lap.
I've got three hundred meters to go. Do I kick now?
But do I wait till one hundred and fifty to kick?
That split second decision making to me is fascinating and
(23:48):
that's what really gets me going. And it's the competition.
As a trained pee teacher, and a kid who wanted
to play and do everything when I was younger. I
just love that element. Now I'm not a crazed compared
like my good mates Ricky Carmichael and Townsend Bell and
James Kin's Cliff, who will fight to the death over anything.
I'm not that bad, but I love the competition.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
Yeah right, Oh, I had never thought about that parallel
specifically of you know, in the moment you have to
make a split second decision as an athlete broadcaster and
then have that immediate reaction or adjustment or oh I
got chills. That was really really cool. Do you think
that when you're talking about that moment, do you feel
(24:34):
that there's a different way to build up that excitement
or to that that moment is experienced if it's a
short sprint type of sport versus a longer endurance.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
Well, that's a really good question, and if it's okay,
there's two answers, and two legitimate answers with a seller
right with a sprint race, so stay For instance, during
this football season, you heard a lot of my voice.
SENBC used a lot of my voice on promos for
Shaiki richardson the one hundred meter World women's world champion.
(25:07):
You know, I work with Ado Bolden, Olympic legend Sonya
Richards Ross. Our track and field team is amazing. But
on the on the short sprints, I work with Ado Bolden,
who's a two four time Olympic medalist, two silvers, two bronze.
And so what will happen is before the race, Ato
and I do a lot of like back and forth,
give and go. You know, he's Julie Lennow his lead
defeat here, and you give a little background as you're
(25:29):
going through the lain ideas like that. But once the
gun goes off, you know, I'll always pause, peop, want
to hear the gun, and then I'm into it and it's,
you know, ten seconds, eleven seconds, man less than ten seconds,
it's it's over and done with boom. And so you've
done a bit of that story set up there and
then it comes to that, to that peak and that
natural crescendo of course at the finish with a NASCAR
(25:50):
race or an IndyCar race or twenty four hours at Daytona.
The roll for Daytona, it's more like a golf tournament
where you've got that rolling story for a lot longer
but you've got to take the pieces of that story,
retell it, remind people. Maybe people went with you for
the first half of the broadcast or whatever, people tune
(26:10):
in and tune out. You've got to go back and
you've got to gather up all those pieces, which there
are more pieces than they were in the women's one
hundred meter World final. You've got to gather all those
pieces up and bring it back and still bring it
to a crescendo. But it might not be as crazy
as calling a one hundred meter final. But two great,
two exciting finishes, two ways to tell a story, but
(26:32):
just two different ways.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Yeah no, and thank you for walking through that because
having absolutely no broadcast experience. A question that I had was,
in longer races or events, do you instinctively know win
to talk and when to let it be silent? And
is that different in different sports or is just kind
of the gut feeling or do you have someone telling
you all right, is there any producer in the booth
(26:55):
who's guiding as well?
Speaker 2 (26:59):
Well, we don't have a during the booth per se
our producer, so on oh our headsets on? You can
talk to that, you talk to the truck and then
these days there's quite a bit of and it's not
just on NBC, it's cross all networks. Is quite a
bit of remote production. So say, for instance, when we
did the roll X twenty four at Daytona. The I
(27:19):
Wheather Tech Sportscar Championship is a NASCAR owned property and
the production comes out even though it airs on NBC,
it is produced out of NASCAR productions in Charlotte, North Carolina,
or Concord, North Carolina, and so our entire so the
collaboration of NBC people and NASCAR production stuff. They're in
North Carolina. Myself, Calvin Fish, Townsend Bell, James Hinchketh Hinch
(27:44):
was driving. But you know, everybody, Jeff Burton, Steve Latart,
Weather this year, everybody is on site at Daytona. So
when we're talking, when we're hitting the button and talking
to our producer, they're up in North Carolina. But to
your point, it's to blend. Everybody has their job to
do and then everybody it has to come together. It's
(28:05):
like a symphony. You know, the producer is the conductor
and everybody's got to come together. All those musical instruments
got to come together. So it sounds good. Sometimes they'll
say layout and layout means zip it right, let's have
a listen to the cars, or they'll say or they'll
they'll say layout, Marty Schnyder is coming in or whatever.
It's like this, give and go, push and pull. The
(28:28):
director has taking care of the pictures, the producer takes
care of the storylines. But for as long as all
of us have been doing it, we know as well,
and if we're talking a little bit too much, we
certainly hear about it from the boss. So it's kind
of the answer is all of the above.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Yeah, and that makes sense. And is it tough to
be talking and then hearing something in your ear and
getting that feedback? If there is that overlap.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
For me, it's not because I've been doing it for
so long, but I do see when when new people
come into the booth or whatever you can tell it,
it jolts them because they're like, you have to almost
just let it soak in. And it's only time that
that gets you used to it, you know, because you
can hear it, and as you're delivering it, you've got
(29:17):
to you know, you got to focus to get your
words out. Meanwhile, this is coming in and somehow it's
absorbing it. And then I'll finish my sentence and we'll say,
and Julie has more and I don't even I don't
even remember half the time that they say Julie's up
next whatever. It just goes in and we spit it out.
You know. Sometimes sometimes you forget to be honest, sometimes
(29:39):
you do forget. Like they might be saying, you know,
I'm thinking, in my head, is it Marty Snyder or
Kevin Lee? I can't remember, so I hit the talk
back who is it? They'll be like, Kevin, all right,
here's Kevin Lee. You know. Yeah, And you do that
because you can't take it all in. But contrary to
what people people think, which we get told this all
the time, people think that during an IndyCar race or
(30:02):
the Rolex twenty four or something that goes on for
hours and hours and hours, that we're reading a script.
I just want to let it, just want to let
everybody know there is no script for a live event.
Yeah happening. We're seeing it when you're seeing it, so
there is no script. So we're not reading a script.
And also the producer can't speak that fast, and we
(30:22):
can't take it in that fast that the producers telling
us what to say. So that's what we get paid
for as commentators.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yeah, which honestly brings up kind of another even parallel
between racers and broadcasters. Is this idea that you will
have someone like unprompted talking in your ear. For us,
it's a spotters or you know, the team whoever, and
you have you can't let that mess you up. And
I know, like you know talking, you have to talk
with your spot to make sure like, hey, okay, it's
going to distract me if you're talk in the middle
(30:49):
of the turn, try to keep it on the straightaways
or something like that. But if you need to get information,
like you have to be ready to not get distracted.
So oh, so many parallels in.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
How a lot of parallels.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, that is so cool. We're going to take one
more quick break, but then we'll be right back with Lee.
We are back with Lee, And if I'm honest with
Julia Landauer, I want to dive in a little more
into the prep for broadcasting and kind of twofold one.
(31:23):
When you get told, okay, we want you to comment
on track and field if you had not watched that
sport before, or been intimately familiar with it. What does
that kind of research and onboarding into being knowledgeable about
a sport look like.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
I'm fanatical about watching type as they say, So I
will go back and I'll just make this up that
pulled me in to do this particular track and field mat.
And there's already been seven track and field mats this year.
I will go back and watch all seven of those mates,
and I will watch every event and I will log.
(32:01):
I will log it like, note, take this is what
happened and Heat one of the women's fifteen hundred, Heat
two of the fifteen hundred, and it'll be like this
person made this past and so I'll have my own
notes watching going back and watching that, or it could
be simple as that event from the previous year. I'll
go back and watch it and make really specific notes.
(32:22):
Then you have our research department, which is just incredible
at NBC Sports, especially the Olympic Research Department, and they
gather everything possible. Now that's great that they gather it.
The hard part is you have to read it it all,
you have to ingest it all, you have to read it,
(32:44):
soak it in, make your own notes off to the side,
and you know for good or for bad. It's kind
of like taking in this much stuff to maybe use
this much stuff. But you have to do that because
safe For instance, in June we have the US Track
(33:04):
and Field US Olympic Track and Field Team Trials. There's
lots of events because there's so many competitors and you
don't know who is going to make it or who
isn't going to make it. You've got your favorites for sure,
but then there's surprises, so you have to make sure
that you've studied pretty much everybody because if somebody is
(33:24):
a surprise winner, you better not be left shorthanded, right,
So you've got to have something to say on everybody.
So trying to think of giving you a succinct answer,
it's watching tape, it's reading what the research department come
up with. It's it's additional stuff. Our team that I
work with on track and field are incredible because the
majority of them are former athletes, they are Olympians, they're
(33:45):
world champions. They're incredible in the contacts that they have
in the sport. We do have lots of production meetings.
It's nobody's left behind, so to speak, Like it's all
in NBC makes it incredible for you to have. It's
almost like Team Penske if you wish that Roger Penske's
going to make sure his drivers have the best people
(34:08):
and the best equipment so you don't and the best
testing and the best you know, sim stuff and the
best whatever so that when it comes time to race,
there's no excuses. You can't say, oh, I didn't have
this or I didn't have that. And it's the same
with NBC. They make sure you have everything you need,
so it's up to you to do your homework and
then go and do your job.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
Yeah, so would the research department be responsible for giving
you like technical elements of a sport. So like I'm
thinking with track and field, I'm sure that there are
technical ways that they land when they're running on their
feet or like a certain.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
I don't know well enough to that's that's more out.
That's more for our analysts. That's more for our experts.
Will they will do certainly do rules, rules and regulations,
historical statistics, and then anything where they're really good is
controversial things, And in track and field there's a lot
of controversy because of athletes failing drug tests. Et cetera.
(35:07):
We've gone through the last few years the highly controversial
topic of shoes, you know, super shoes with the carbon
plates and the shoes and things like that. And so
where our research department is incredible is in the correct wording,
the correct phraseology, and how to handle it. We have, sadly,
(35:28):
in the last twelve months, we've had some deaths in
the sport, most notably Tory Bouie. And you know, we
all commentated on toy and you know, some of the
ladies I work with competed with her, and you know
it's devastating. I've commentated on her, and so you have
(35:49):
to handle that in the appropriate manner. And that's where
our research department come in with historical contexts, real real
skill at being appropriately, appropriately sensitive and right words at
(36:09):
the right time. And now not always are they fed
to us like well as adults. You have to you
have to do that. I mean, I've had to do
it so many times in motorsports, sadly, where you know,
commentating on career ending crashes and sometimes life ending crashes
and that has not been fun. And there's nobody telling
you what to say. You're on your own and you
have to find the right words at the right time.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
As you're processing everything, and you're also human, and I
would assume that there's some more interpersonal relationship that you
develop with a lot of these athletes. And so do
you in those moments, do you feel like you're able
to console the family? And I'm sure it's case by case,
but do you feel like like kind of job aside,
(36:53):
you're able to kind of be with the family or
some condolence. Is that way beyond just over the broadcast?
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Yeah, I think I think you have to. I think
it's in the words that you choose, sotoling the family
or comforting the family rather, I think the words that
you choose maybe the helpful ones. But sometimes, I mean
it's just difficult. I mean I was in I was
in the chair when Justin Wilson, you know, I vividly
remember to this day saying and Wilson into the wall
(37:21):
and that was that was the crash that you know,
that was when Justin passed away. David Hobb, Steve Matchett,
Will Buston and myself we were on the air when
when Juel b Yankee was you know, ultimately he was
killed in that moment, he was kept on life support
for several weeks afterwards, but he was killed in Japan
in that crash with the crane. You know, there's there's
been numerous crashes. I was commentating for Robert Wickens at
(37:46):
Pocono and we were we were, you know, waiting for
and it was certainly more than an hour, maybe close
to two hours where we didn't know if Robbie was
was with us or not. There's been many many in
bikes and cars, and it's it's really tough and you
just have to that's where you forget the job. Yeah,
it's human to human and you just because quite often
(38:10):
to your point, the broadcast is the famili's conduit to
any news. Yeah, sometimes the families there, but often they're
not an extended family. They're relying on us to give
them an update. And yeah, a big burden of responsibility
and and you well, boy, there's nothing that there's nothing
(38:30):
that makes you find the right words at the right
time and then something like that.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
Yeah, and it's it's I mean, it's so impressive because
like a lot of times, words will just escape. And
obviously you're a professional and so words are what you do.
But yeah, I mean I remember I was in my
college dorm as a sophomore when Dan Weldon passed, and
like that was the first and I've been racing since
I was ten, and so that was the first race
that I was watching live where there was the this fatality.
(39:02):
And I clearly remember feeling the emotion of the broadcasters
or well, I don't remember if you were there or not,
but reporting on that one. But you need that human
connectivity almost in those moments, and it's kudos to all
the broadcasters that that have to do that. Switching gears
a little bit still to that preparation work. Can we
(39:24):
get a little granular about like the week of right,
so let's say you're commentating on an IndyCar race or
a let's do the twenty four hours of Daytona, because
they have all the build up with the roar before
twenty four all of that. But when you get to
the like Monday before the Saturday start of that race,
what does the week look like or the prep or
is it what does that look like?
Speaker 2 (39:46):
Well prep has changed a lot because of these things. Right, h.
So once upon a time, once upon a time, you
would get press releases on a fax machine. True, there
was no social media, and there was no Internet, and
then now with social media we probably people like you
(40:07):
and me and sports people all over the world. You
don't even think about how much you're absorbing on a
daily basis simply by the accounts that you follow. So
there's that, but that's fun. We follow that for fun,
but it's also very informative, whether it be team based
news or driver based news, and drivers and athletes totally
(40:29):
because it's their own they will stay a lot more
than what they will in a press release or a
news conference or whatever it might be. So I mean,
that's an easy one, so hit that one up. Then
there's interviews that maybe the governing body arrangers. So imps
are very good about doing driver zooms, and they'll do
(40:51):
it by team, so it might be okay on Monday
that such and such whatever it's Vasa Sullivan Lexus, and
they'll have all six of their drivers of al to
the media. So the media you can do that, and
that's good one on one time. Then outside of that,
you've got your own personal relationships simply calling team owners
or calling drivers. We then have an Inser, an inser
(41:15):
research team which also do NASCAR. It's the same group
of guys out of North Carolina who do NASCAR as well,
and they do inso also where they will provide it's
more it's more statistically based information. But then it's all
of the team and driver bios. So you've got that
(41:37):
to go through to make sure. For years, Calvin Fish
and Brian Till and myself we've been making our own books.
So we will have a book about that thick. I'll
go down the road to the local UPS store and
I get it bound and that's kind of like my
bible for the week. In there is historical statistics, all
of the teams, the bios. It's a page two pages
(41:59):
per team. It's got everything on there that you need.
It's got just anything and everything that I need for
the week, scheduling, you know, meetings, this, that and the other,
any historical kind of notes that I need. And then
it's time on the ground, which is so that's all
of the pre stuff. But once you get on the
(42:21):
ground at Daytona, then you hit the ground running and
the garage area. The paddock is the beast. It's like
a buffet of stories, right, so you've got to get
in there and try and get something from every team,
and that's where again, it might be in a press release,
might be at a news conference, you'll find something out
by the front tire changer or the refueler will tell
(42:41):
you something. Then you get to the drivers, or the
driver's wife or a girlfriend, or you'll see one of
the parents or whatever it might be, the engineer will
tell you something. And so you've just got to make
sure you get all of those down. And you may
never use it, but you might because that team or
that driver might be doing well and you'll be like, hey,
I've got a pretty good little one here. He scored
(43:02):
a hole in one at LPGA National earlier this week
playing with his grandfather who'd never been to the roll
twenty four at Daytona. You know all those crazy little
side stories. So the long way around the roundabout to
your question, Julie, is everything and anything. It all goes
into the hopper and you've got to know when to
(43:23):
pull it out. So that that's the granular is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
It's every bloody day. It's as much as you can
file into this.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
Yeah, tixel a lot of endurance and stamina, I'm sure,
so do you have any pre broadcast rituals.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
I will always wear the same clean but the same
kind of socks. I was going to say, really, I
was going to say, I was going to say, I
always wear the same kind of socks. I will always
wear makes.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
It feel better. I didn't think that you didn't wash
your socks, because for anyone.
Speaker 2 (43:58):
My favorite, I'll always wear blacks socks always, and I
always have to have like a Friday Saturday Sunday, like
my race weekend socks, and that goes for track and field,
or if I was doing golf, it would be Thursday, Friday,
Saturday Sunday. But always wear black socks and the socks
dejure at the moment a foot joy socks for joy
anklet socks because they're so comfortable. And so I think
(44:22):
maybe that might be the only free broadcast routine or
or that's pretty significant. That takes planning. That sucks. I
don't know, No, I don't, I mean, you know, I
make sure I make sure always before we go on air,
like always give give the guys like a fist pump
or a pat on the back, and we always like
get each other pumped up, just we always wish wish
(44:45):
each other a good show. It's like a driver wishing
you know the crew or the driver saying to the crew,
chief of the team, it's a good one. Like we
always pump each other up. There's no yeah, there's no
there's no food or meal or or any anything fine
anything funny like that. Uh, that's okay. Always. I always
wear the same, always wear the same risk things. I
(45:07):
have two things on my wrist and one of them
is a is a hard like a hard bracelet, and
that says dream, believe, achieve. So I always have that
on I love that I have. I have a I
do have one free broadcast ritual or a broadcast ritual
when I do the Indy five hundred. My dad passed
away a long time ago and never got to see
(45:27):
me call the Olympics, saw the Indy five hundred, and
so I my dad had a favorite ring on his
right hand. So I always wear if you ever, if
you ever take a close look at me at the
Indy five hundred, if I'm wearing if I'm holding the
microphone in my right hand, I'll wear it. And I
never wear a ring on my right hand. I'll have
I'll have a silver ring on my right hand that's
my dad's and I only wear it at the Indy
(45:48):
five hundred.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
I'll go back and look for that because that's a
really beautiful tribute. That's really nice. So last question or
no second, last question before we get into if you're honest,
but do you still get at all nervous or butterflies
or a certain Jinisa Kwai and your guy before a broadcast.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Don't get nervous at all. It's more performance based. You
want to do a good job like you want to
so it's more getting revved up. It's not nervous. I
love my job, so therefore that's you know, I think
you get on edge, and that being on edge is
(46:29):
different to nervous. I think if you don't have, if
you if you don't have a good comfort level in
what you're doing, that would be nerves. Probably the last time,
probably the last time I can ever experience having some
kind of nerves was a couple of years ago when
we were doing the Winter Olympics and we came straight
(46:51):
off the back of the super Bowl and it was
a new category of bob sledd. It was called monobob
for women only, so it's the two person Bob Slade,
but one female athlete in there, and we were doing
the final run. It was the fourth and final run,
and Mike Tariko had finished, you know, NBC Sports had
finished the Super Bowl, and Mike threw to me and
(47:12):
we took it from there for the final ten athletes,
and thank goodness, Team USA got gold and silver and
it was the only medals at the sliding center in
the Beijing Games for Team USA. And we had we
knew it was going to be a big audience and
it turned it turned out there was thirty million people
for that half an hour commercial three and I knew
(47:35):
it was going to be a big audience. And so
again it wasn't nerves, but it was anxiousness to say,
we've got to like, got to do a good job
for the network. It just got to do a good
job for the network. So that was the last time
I can ever really remember like feeling a little bit
anxious just to make sure it was good, and especially
when it was funneling down to the team last two
(47:59):
Team USA lids and then the women end up getting
gold and silver, which is just an awesome story totally.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
That's an interesting distinction though that nervousness would imply feeling
not like quite there from a craft perspective or a
training a perspective, whereas like the edge or I think anxiety,
like that little bit of anxiousness or anxiety is one.
But I hadn't really thought about that distinction because I've
(48:26):
always said if you're not a little nervous, then you
don't or being a little nervous shows that you care.
But I do like that specificity in that distinction. I will, yeah,
I might, I might adopt that moving forward. So last
question for you before the rapid fire. Is there a
sport that you have not yet been able to comment
on that you would.
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Like to As a kid I played. This doesn't mean
anything to the North American audience, maybe maybe maybe some
of your viewers a little bit. Is a f L,
which is Aussie rules football. And so when the Grand
Final happens, which is like the super Bowl for Australian football,
(49:06):
it's at the MCG, the Melbourne Cricket Ground. There's one
hundred and ten thousand people there. It's massive. And I
played AFL, or played Aussie Rules football as a kid,
and no people involve love it still follow my favorite team,
which is Carlton, and it's a fast flowing game and
I never ever have had the opportunity to commentate that,
(49:29):
and it's probably a bit the opportunity or the moment
has moved on by I think it's probably too late
for that. But I always thought that I may have
made a pretty decent footy commentator just because of the
fast flowing nature of it. You know, I love I
love the variety that I've had in my career, you know,
(49:51):
everything from golf to sailing, to all the motorsports stuff,
to track and field to rowing at the real Olympics.
You know, NBC has been a to me to throw
the range of opportunities my way and to rugby. You know,
I've commentated collegiate rugby to World seven's to you know everything.
(50:12):
So it's been a it's been a it's been a
really fun ride.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Well, they know what they're doing because, as we've talked about,
you carry that natural enthusiasm and like are so so
engaging to listen to. And I've, like, you know, from
the whole from as long as I've seen you on TV,
I have appreciated that and so thank you and you're
really phenomenal at what you do, so keep it up
because we love it.
Speaker 2 (50:34):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
So jumping into if you were honest rapid fire, what
is your favorite place that you've ever lived?
Speaker 2 (50:41):
Favorite place I've ever lived was on the beach in
Sydney Queenscliffe, Sydney, lived on the headland and instead of
looking at the ocean coming towards you, my wife and
I lived on the headland, on the rocky headland, so
the waves came around this peninsula. So we would sit
out on now balcony and watch the waves go left
(51:02):
to right. So we'd sit out on the balcony, have
a gin and tonic on sunset and have some little
cheese and crackers between us and watch the waves go
this way. And the beach went all the way down
that way, down south to Manly. So that was on
Sydney's northern beaches. It was spectacular.
Speaker 1 (51:18):
That sounds absolutely divine and I don't think I've ever
watched the waves.
Speaker 2 (51:22):
Go yeah, right, yeah, it's pretty It's pretty different.
Speaker 1 (51:25):
You ever thought about that? Yeah, that is so cool.
What Summer Olympics sport are you most looking forward to
watching this year?
Speaker 2 (51:33):
The one that I'm working on track and field.
Speaker 1 (51:34):
There we go, There we go. Silly question. When you're
watching sports for fun, do you note to yourself how
the commentators are doing or can you fuck it out?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
No? I don't. That to me is not it's not
fair on them. If I if I'm watching, I'm watching
for the sport. I'm not listening to them because you know,
I know many of people do that to me, and
you know I don't enjoy it. You know, like there's
enough critics out there. They don't need me. They don't
(52:07):
need me to be a critic as well. I love
and I when I do any kind of media training
or anything like that, or I get asked by young
broadcasters or young journalists or whatever, I encourage them to
do what I do. And I try and watch as
many different sports as I can, even if I don't
really I'm not really into that sport. I like to
(52:30):
watch it to hear how hear and see how they
present it and how they storytell. And there's something out
there for all of us. Because you know, if you
get stuck in your groove or stuck in a rut,
that's not very appealing. Being inflexible is not very appealing.
We can learn we can all learn from others about
(52:51):
how you speak, how you present, how you know the
rise and fall in your voice, the humor, the interaction
with your on air colleagues, the interaction with the athletes,
interviewing techniques, sending, receiving. There's so much to be learned.
And I just think everybody. You know, there's an old
song from a British band called Gruva Marta, and one
(53:15):
of the lyrics says, if everybody looked the same, we'd
be tired of looking at each other, right, So difference
is the key. And so just to see what people
are doing on NBA at the moment, to see what golf,
the golf teams are doing, whether it's on NBC Sports
or the Golf Channel, or it's on CBS. You know,
watch the Masters a couple of weekends ago to watching
(53:35):
you know football, we all watch football, whatever it might be.
I just love listening to see how they're doing it.
You know, it's not up to me to grade them.
Speaker 1 (53:44):
That's a really fantastic perspective. Last, if you're honest, what
is something that you're grateful for right now?
Speaker 2 (53:51):
My family, my wife and I have two terrific boys.
They're fifteen and thirteen. They they've always been very open
minded with everything from travel to food to meeting people,
and we just took them. They had their spring break
and they came to Foxborough in Massachusetts to monstrategy Supercross
(54:13):
with me, and then we took them straight out to
the West Coast for Long Beach for the MS Indycardal
Better and you know, they got to meet everybody. One weekend,
they're hanging out with Ricky Carmichael. The next weekend they're
meeting Mario Andretti, and they met a bunch of different people.
They went into the Ganassi Hauller and met Scott Dixon
on the weekend that he had that most improbable victory.
So I'm most thankful, most grateful for my family because
(54:37):
as a dad and a husband, I'm a why a
lot and they're super understanding. My wife and kids are
super understanding too for me to be a traveling, working dad,
and you know, I just make sure that when I'm home,
i'm present, I'm here because i know that I'm going
to be gone, you know, in the next few days
to wherever it is next. So I'm very grateful for
(54:58):
my family.
Speaker 1 (54:59):
Yeah, that's great and I'm sure that they see your
enthusiasm for what you're doing and what I assume would
be enthusiasm for life as well, and that's got to
be infectious and inspiring and kind of makes it all worthwhile.
So yeah, thank you for sharing that. Also, I got
to meet Scott Dixon at the SPS one year. I
was like, oh my gosh, look we're meeting racing royalty.
(55:20):
That is so cool.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
A humble hero he.
Speaker 1 (55:24):
Is, like, oh my goodness, yeah so much them was like, people,
do you realize who was sitting right there? Like it
was incredible. I know that racing is not the most
watched sport everywhere compared to like NBA and stuff, but yeah, no,
it was really incredible just to see his presence in
that moment. And now that we have manifested you commentating
(55:44):
on the AFL, I hope that that's in your future
and that's amazing. So Lee, where can people find you
online if they would like to follow you.
Speaker 2 (55:52):
And hear more from that? Just simply on Twitter and
on Instagram at Lee Diffy And it's spelt like a
girl l e I g h at l e i
g h d i f f e y.
Speaker 1 (56:06):
I had never thought about the gendered spelling of Lee.
But you know what I know. I went to middle
school with a girl who spelled her name l e E.
Speaker 2 (56:14):
That's right, all parents her name l e E. Yeah.
I asked my parents the same, and they said, well,
it didn't matter if you were going to be a
boy or girl. It's it's you can use it both ways.
And I'm like, yeah, okay, no worries. Well I'm still
when I check in the hotels or whatever, it says
welcome miss Lee diffee, I get, I get, I get mail,
(56:34):
I get mail, it says miss or missus Lee Deffe.
So I'm used to it by now. When I was
a kid, here's a story that Dario, Frank Kitty and
Alan McNish and those guys just love that. And I
think Calvin Fish told them this, so they always bring
it up. But when I was a kid, I think
I was ten years old and in Australia, and I
(56:55):
want a competition, I want a bicycle, and based on
the spelling of my name, they sent me a girls bot.
Speaker 1 (57:01):
No way, Hey, character building.
Speaker 2 (57:03):
Right, Hey, this is cold if I'm honest. So I
was just honest and told you that story.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
I love that you leaned into the theme of this podcast.
Thank you so much. Lee spelled L E I g H,
but not girls. Lee, No, this was incredible. Thank you
so much for joining me. I really appreciate your insights
into everything that we discussed. Everyone that is our show.
Thank you so much. If you enjoyed this episode, please
share it with a friend, and as always, thank you
for letting us be honest with you and I look
(57:28):
forward to seeing you next week.
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