Unless you are one of the lucky fans who have access to the digital television coverage of Formula One - also known as Bernievision - you are likely to be missing a lot of the action. Barry Kalb is one of those who have to be content with the terrestrial coverage. Here, he offers some solutions to improve the show for those who watch the races at home

Here's the scene on a Grand Prix Sunday: I'm in the bedroom, a glass of beer or wine at my right hand, eyes glued to the TV screen, totally involved as the drivers dice for position. My wife comes into the room, glances at the screen, and groans. "I don't know how you can sit there watching cars go round and round and round for hours at a time," she says. She turns, muttering a mocking "Vroom! Vroom!" under her breath, and exits laughing like a loon.

Okay, I don't expect everyone to like Formula One, or any type of motor racing for that matter. It would be easier to explain the attraction to skeptics like my family, though, if television did a better job of showing what it's all about.

Formula One became rich and robust thanks to TV coverage. I want Bernie Ecclestone to expend some muscle, and some money if necessary, to see that the coverage is improved. (F1 is more interesting to watch than NASCAR races, which on television look like footage of the Hollywood Freeway at rush hour.)

There is no way television can match the experience of actually being at a race track. The incredible noise, the breathtaking speeds, are impossible to capture fully on the small screen. The coverage of the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa, however, showed what TV is capable of, and it is clearly capable of far better than what we viewers have been getting up to now.

The piece de resistance at Spa: that extended bird's-eye shot of the cars starting uphill after La Source hairpin, the almost violent right-hand lurch into Eau Rouge, and then the sweeping left up and over the crest of the hill through Radillon. It was a new camera angle, the camera itself located somewhere above and downfield from Radillon, and I've never before seen a television shot that gives the viewer such a dramatic feel for what Formula One racing is all about.

This year's coverage also included a camera located below Eau Rouge, showing close-ups of the cars making that breathtaking change of direction from the straight into the curve itself, at times with the tail hanging out - a real, old-fashioned, four-wheel drift! Watching that, the viewer can understand why Grand Prix drivers call this the most exciting corner in Formula One.

Another bit of excellence: the perfectly composed, medium close-up, head-on shot of the entry to the Bus Stop chicane, which showed with unusual clarity how the drivers flick their cars left and right through switchbacks like this one. Driving a Formula One car at speed has been likened to driving on black ice, and watching the cars literally skating over the curbs at the Bus Stop, one could begin to understand what that means.

Compare these shots with the standard coverage of, say, the German Grand Prix at Hockenheim. The course is composed mostly of long straights. The coverage is composed mostly of foreshortened, head-on camera angles that make the cars look like they're cruising along a country road. The alternative at Hockenheim is endless slow-motion replays of the cars going through one of the chicanes, with close-ups of the tires. It's mildly interesting once, then it's boring.

In most cases, the only time the television viewer gets a feel for the speeds involved in Grand Prix racing is when an accident occurs and the direction of a car is deflected suddenly. The acceleration of a Formula One car almost beggers belief, but the standard TV shot of the start of a race makes it look like a slow-motion ballet. The viewer received a very good idea in July of what really goes on, however, when Luciano Burti's Prost slammed into the rear of Michael Schumacher's Ferrari at the start of the German Grand Prix and was suddenly launched skyward like a ballistic missile.

The head-on, foreshortened shot of Burti and Eddie Irvine dicing through Blanchimont at Spa looked almost like two cars passing on a freeway-until the cars touched, and Burti's car flew across the path of the camera and rammed the tire wall with a force that could almost be felt through the TV screen.

The thing is, at Spa, the viewer for the most part could feel the speed no matter what was going on. The cameras were well placed, and the director used what he had to great advantage. On several occasions, he stayed with Giancarlo Fisichella's on-board camera for the better part of a lap. This was real reportage, in that we learned why Fisichella was able to keep his notoriously under-performing Benetton in second place for much of this race: it was clear from the way he skated the car through the turns that it was handling beautifully. At the post-race press conference, Fisichella said Benetton had finally given him a car that was easier to drive, and for once we at home knew just what he was talking about.

Granted, Spa provides an unbeatable television opportunity, with its combination of dips and rises, the forest setting, the spectacular straight-line speeds and sweeping corners. Still, this year's coverage of the race was a quantum leap over previous years, and similar improvements could certainly be made at other tracks.

Race coverage for the most part is in the hands of the national television station of the host country, and while some local directors are good, others should be fired right away. Some will spend inordinate amounts of time with the camera on their local boy, even if their local boy is running 21st out of 22 and has just been lapped for the third time. At Imola in 1994, the director from RAI, the Italian national network, chose to remain focused on the dying Ayrton Senna long past the point of good taste or news value.

Bernie Ecclestone may only have so much influence over what the local director chooses to show, but I would suggest that Ecclestone, who is no shrinking violet, try to exercise greater influence. With tens of millions of viewers around the world for each race, the local stations presumably profit handily from Formula One coverage. Ecclestone should be in a position to demand certain standards of professionalism from the directors in charge of Formula One broadcasts-perhaps he should appoint one top-notch director for all the races. Ecclestone should demand better and more imaginative camera angles, like those at Spa. If necessary, he could help pay for additional cameras.

The on-board cameras are rarely exploited to their full potential. As often as not, a director will cut to a particular on-board camera for no discernible reason: the driver is far back in the field, he has no other cars in sight. It would have been great at Spa to watch David Coulthard trying to get past Fisichella from Coulthard's camera. And why not an occasional lap from the camera of the race leader? Whatever problems the drivers behind him were having at Spa, Michael Schumacher was going fast. What a treat it would have been to take a lap around this spectacular track with the world's best driver.

Instead, we rode with Heinz-Harald Frentzen, who was a lap behind. Camera angles at most tracks can be improved. The most complex part of the Hockenheim track is the stadium infield, but all we see there is a rear shot of the cars entering the stadium, and then a single long shot from opposite the pits that zooms in and out, following the cars through a series of turns. Aiming cameras at the apexes, and putting them reasonably close to the action, can show what happens to a car as it goes through a turn on the limit of adhesion and how fast it is moving.

When my wife and daughter mock me, I tell them: if you had any idea what's going on in those cars, what those drivers are doing, you'd appreciate it. I've given up any hope of their ever watching races with me, but if the coverage were more dramatic, they might at least not think I'm a complete fool.