MAVTV

MAVTV
Launched	October 1, 2004
Owned by	Lucas Oil
Picture format	480i (SDTV) 1080i (HDTV)
Slogan	American Real
Country	United States
Broadcast area	National
Headquarters	Corona, California
Formerly called	Maverick Television
Website	mavtv.com
Availability
Satellite
Dish Network (US)	Channel 248 (HD)
DirecTV (US)	Channel 214 (SD)
Cable
Verizon FIOS	Channel 810 (HD)
Available on select cable systems	Check local listings

MAVTV (originally known as Maverick Television) is a general entertainment cable and satellite television channel, focused towards what the network's management claims is an "action-oriented family audience", featuring films, motorsports, and other acquired series programming.

History

MAVTV launched on October 1, 2004 based out of Atlanta with distribution limited to select cable companies, with the name a shortening of Maverick Television. The network was privately held and founded by four former executives from Showtime Networks—Steve Severn, Steve Smith, Doug Jost, Rob Stevens.

Purchase by Lucas Oil and change of programming direction

In October 2011, longtime partner lubricants company Lucas Oil purchased MAVTV; the company had provided and sponsored most of the network's motorsports rights even before their purchase, and the network was likely to go dark without the purchase as programming rights had deteriorated towards barter programming and heavy repeats of library content. The network was quickly reformatted away by the new management from a completely male focus featuring lowbrow comedies, low-tier male targeting programming and Canadian content dramas with low cost purchase rights, and late night shows featuring women in bikini shoots towards a general family programming direction.

On July 4, 2012, Lucas rebranded the network, keeping the MAVTV name (now all capitalized), but with the MAV initials standing for "Movies, Action, and Variety" with the addition of films and more concert programming to the schedule, and a gradual drawdown of racing-related programming to a smaller, yet important part of the schedule to maintain its cable carriage mainly among digital sports tiers, including the Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series and the Lucas Oil Pro Pulling League. The network also airs classic programming such as The Lone Ranger, Starsky & Hutch, and Bonanza as well as a number of programs from the now-defunct SPEED Channel.

Past programming

The network added a full HD feed in the 3rd quarter of 2008 to complement the standard 24/7 lineup; the 480i SDTV network is optimized for widescreen television sets in full mode to provide a full widescreen experience. MAVTV also produces and carries a large library of native 1080i HD series.

Before Lucas Oil took over full management of the network, MAVTV carried programming such as the second season of Rad Girls, SpeedFreaks, Women's Flat Track Roller Derby, American Tailgater, AMA Motorcycle Racing, Wrestlicious TakeDown, Ultimate Combat Experience, Bikini AllStars and Best of the Best. In addition, MAVTV presented a documentaries slanted only towards men, entitled Manumentaries. Except for existing Lucas Oil programming and the AMA, none of this programming currently remains on the network's schedule. Overnights had been filled by music video/interactive SMS programming from NOYZ via a time brokerage agreement before that company went bankrupt in early 2008.

Sports deals

In 2007, MAVTV struck a deal with the Women's Flat Track Derby Association to broadcast two of the three roller derby finals: the Eastern Regional Tournament (Heartland Havoc, which was broadcast as a series of one-hour weekly episodes)^[1] and the National Championships (Texas Shootout).^[2]

MAVTV contracted with the Automobile Racing Club of America, the auto racing sanctioning body, to air at least 6 races in 2008, including both 100-mile dirt races at the Illinois State Fairgrounds in Springfield, and the Southern Illinois State Fairgrounds in DuQuoin.^[3] SpeedFreaks hosts Kenny Sargent and Crash Gladys also appeared on episodes of the Lucas Motorsports hour.

MAVTV sponsored the MAVTV 500, the final race in the 2012 season of the IndyCar Series, which took place at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California.

MAVTV is partnered with King of the Cage, broadcasting their live and past Martial Arts events, as well as Championship Wrestling From Hollywood.

MAVTV did their 1st live motorsports event, the Lucas Oil Challenge Cup featuring the Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series on October 27, 2013 from Lake Elsinore Motorsports Park. They will also do live coverage of the Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals, one of the biggest midget car races every year. The East Bay Winter Nationals from the Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series and all Moto1 rounds of the Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motorcross championship in 2014. They will also cover several King of the Cage MMA events live in 2014.^[4]

In 2014, MAVTV partnered with professional road racing series Pirelli World Challenge to air the Pirelli World Challenge Touring Car Championship.

Movie deals

On April 27, 2010, MAVTV signed a deal with Sony Pictures giving them access to select titles from Sony's film library. The deal is part of MAVTV's programming strategy to expand its schedule to include Hollywood blockbuster films.^[5] The network added films from the Warner Bros. library in July 2012.

Availability

MAVTV can be found in the US on Cablevision (iO), Charter Communications, GCI in Alaska, select cable systems within the Caribbean Co-op, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Verizon FIOS, DirecTV, Dish Network, and C-Band Satellite. MAVTV was added to the Dish Network lineup on May 8, 2009 in high definition.

On November 29, 2012 Verizon FiOS announced it is removing the channel from its TV service effective on or after December 31, 2012. It is available as an "On Demand" service. However the channel is returned to Verizon on June 10, 2014.

DirecTV added MAVTV on June 10, 2013. The channel is being carried in standard definition.^[6]

Programming

Motorsports coverage

• - Acceleration (2014-present)
• - Geico AMA Endurocross
• - American Sprint Boat Racing Association
• - Lucas Oil ASCS Sprint Car Series
• - Mountain Dew ATVMX National Championship (2014-present)
• - Australasian Superbike Championship (2014-present)
• - Australian Drifting Grand Prix (2014-present)
• - ANDRA Drag Racing Series (2014-present)
• - Best In The Desert
• - British Drift Championship
• - British Motocross Championship
• - Lucas Oil Chili Bowl Nationals presented by General Tire (2014-present)
  • - Saturday night alphabet mains are featured live.
• - FIA European Drag Racing Championship
• - Sidecar World Championships
• - FIM Supermoto World Championship
• - FIM X-Trial World Championship
• - Ice Speedway Gladiators
• - INEX Legends Cars & Bandolero Cars (2014-present)
  • - The 2014 season of the Jack in the Box Summer Shootout aired on the network.
  • - Apart of the Acceleration 2014 coverage, the Legend SuperCup was aired on the network
• - Knoxville Raceway's Dirt Dreams (2014-present)
• - Kuhmo Tyres V8 Touring Car Series
• - Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross Championship
  • -First Moto
• - Lucas Oil Drag Boat Racing Series
• - Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
  • - live coverage of the East Bay Winter Nationals
• - Lucas Oil Modified Series
• - Lucas Oil Off Road Racing Series
  • - The 2013 Lucas Oil Challenge Cup was live on the network, it was the network's first live race. The series did not feature live coverage in 2014 however.
• - Lucas Oil Pro Pulling League
• - Lucas Oil POWERI Midgets
  • - the 2013 & 2014 Jason Leffler Memorial from Wayne County Speedway was covered on Dirty 30
  • - Other races such as DuQuoin from 2014 will be covered on Lucas Oil On The Edge
• - NEMA Midgets
  • - The 2014 Boston Louie Seymour Memorial at Seekonk was featured with full race coverage on the SPEED SPORT program.
• - Novelis Supermodifieds
  • - 2 to 3 races from the 2014 season at Oswego Speedway were shown on MavTV under the SPEED SPORT program. Those races included the Budweiser International Classic & the Jim Shampine Memorial
• - D1NZ
• - Outlaw kart racing
  • - The network featured the SPEED SPORT Challenge at Millbridge Speedway on the SPEED SPORT program. The event will return to SPEED SPORT in 2015.
• - Pinks All Out
  • - A four-episode revival of the series, to be taped at Rockingham Dragway in July 2015 as four different $10,000 to win races, will air on MAVTV.
• - Pirelli World Challenge (2013, 2014)
  • - TC rounds aired originally on the network, GT/GTA/GTS races from the 2014 season were re-aired on the network afterwards.
• - Powerboat P1 SuperStock Championship
• - SRL Spears Southwest Tour (2014-present)
  • - The 2014 races at Irwindale & The Bullring at LVMS were aired.
• - GEICO Motorcycle Superbike Shootout
• - Superprestigio Dirt Track
  • - The Superprestigio Dirt Track - Barcelona 2014 was featured with full race coverage on the SPEED SPORT program in 2014.
• - The Dirt (2014-present)
  • - The Dirt features the weekly divisions at WXC Speedway at Western Springs.
• - USAC AMSOIL National Sprint Cars (2014-present)
  • - several rounds from the 2014 season were featured on the JackSlash Dirty 30 program. Those include the Kokomo Sprint Car Smackdown, Oval Nationals @ Perris and the season finale at Canyon.
• - V8 Superboats
• - World of Outlaws STP Sprint Cars (2014)
  • - The 54th Annual FVP Knoxville Nationals presented by Lucas Oil were aired on the network in 2014
• - World Rally Championship (2013-present)
  • - live coverage of several stages started in 2014

Motorsport Highlight & Reality Shows

• - Dirty 30/Pavement 30/Jackslash.com
• - Lucas Oil Motorsports Hour
• - Lucas Oil On the Edge
• - SPEED SPORT
• - SPEED SPORT Magazine
• - The Dave Despain Show

References

External links

• Official Network Site
• MAVTV Live Feeds