Charlie King, the ABC's first Indigenous broadcaster selected to cover an Olympic Games, is about to take his place among the highly experienced Grandstand commentary team.

"I'm really excited," Charlie said. "It is difficult to get your head around it because this is the biggest sporting event in the world. I've been to AFL grand finals and the test cricket and all those things where there are massive audiences tuned in around the country but then when you think of this - it's the big one."



Charlie King is more than just a sports commentator. He's considered an icon in the Northern Territory where he's been the voice of ABC Grandstand since 1994.

Born in Alice Springs, Charlie describes himself as an Irish-Scottish-Gurindji man who, away from the microphone, is recognised for his work to improve the lives of Indigenous people in the Territory.

"Being an Indigenous person and being given the opportunity to go the Olympic Games is very, very important for me," he said.

"I've had many calls from people around the country and across the NT saying 'Good on you. Do well. We'll be listening'. You feel a little bit of pressure from that but you also feel proud."

His family are so excited that some of them are flying to Darwin just to see him off.

"It's almost like I'm going to compete," Charlie laughed. "I've got to remind them that I'm going there to work. I suppose they think I'll be standing at the airport wearing the Australian tracksuit or something."

Executive Producer Peter Longman said Charlie is a great addition to the games team.

"He's a vastly experienced broadcaster as is Quentin Hull, from Brisbane, who is also off on his first Olympic Games. I think your first games you do get a bit overawed in some ways about just how big they are. It's obviously the pinnacle of a sports broadcaster's career to be chosen to cover an Olympics."

Our proud record as an Olympic Games broadcaster - unbroken since 1936 - continues with ABC Local Radio's presence at the Beijing games.

For the first time, however, the coverage will not be heard across the entire network. This follows the decision of the commercial radio rights holder 2GB to exclude 702 ABC Sydney listeners from receiving full games commentary.

"This breaks our long-held record of broadcasting to all Australians from every Olympic Games in the modern era," Peter said. "We're extremely disappointed that despite our efforts to include Sydney we were unsuccessful."

An experienced and skilled team of 28 broadcasters, journalists and technical staff will bring punters more than 180 hours of coverage over the two weeks of the games, from August 8.

The team will be aiming for broadcast gold.

"Australian listeners won't miss a thing in Beijing and that will make them feel like they're part of the action," Peter said.

Commentator Tracey Holmes will be playing her part covering a range of sports. This is her seventh games and she brings a unique perspective to Grandstand's coverage, drawing on her experience living in China and working as a presenter on China Central Television.

She's expecting an "absolutely sensational" event with total dominance by China.

"Since they've come back into the Olympics they've crept up the medal tally to second last time round in Athens," Tracey said. "There's only one spot further to go and of course they're going to want to achieve that in China. If they don't, there will be major trouble and it will reveal a whole lot of fault lines in all sorts of other areas in China."

Audiences will also be kept up-to-date by radio and TV news and current affairs and online, through the ABC's Olympics website, abc.net.au/olympics

The ABC's online coverage is bigger and better than ever and for the first time we will have a correspondent, Shane McLeod, dedicated to online reporting.

Executive Producer Stuart Watt says the site will feature as much audio and video as is possible within the rights restrictions. "This will include web-only material such as extended interviews, press conferences and interviews, as well as stories about China."

Other features will include audio diaries from members of the Grandstand commentary team and "a massive improvement in the way results are presented".

The time zone has major implications for online traffic, Stuart explained. "The swimming finals this year are scheduled around lunchtime which means the primary methods of keeping in touch with what's happening will be via the website as lots of people will be at work," he said.