I’ve been spending far too much of my time recently watching marbles and toy cars racing on YouTube. I’ve become obsessed, and I want to explain why.
We’ve all been forced into lockdown over the past few months, and this has meant that we haven’t been able to do a lot of things we used to love.
One of those things is watching sports. There hasn’t been a game of football, rugby or tennis on the TV in the past few months.
I’m a big sports fan, as well as a pop culture enthusiast.
I’m a Liverpool fan, and I love watching rugby and tennis, and these past few months has meant that there have been no live sports on the TV.
I’ve been missing it, and there isn’t much that can take watching live sports’ place.
You could go back and watch old football or rugby games, but it’s not the same.
I didn’t know how much I liked watching live sports until it was gone.
The first month was fine, but the second month was tough, and I found myself really missing watching live sports and Match of the Day on BBC.
You have to watch toy cars race on 3DBotMaker
Watching toy cars race on YouTube is my new obsession – Credit: Pexels
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It was also revealed that the 2020 Tokyo Olympics had been postponed to 2021, and I love watching the Olympics.
So, I was experiencing withdrawal symptoms from watching live sports.
OK, it wasn’t that bad, but I was missing it, and that’s when I watched a recent episode of Last Week Tonight With John Oliver.
He seems to be missing watching live sports as much as I am.
However, it seems as though he’s found the cure.
In a recent episode of Last Week Tonight, John Oliver introduced me to the world of marble racing on YouTube.
He went on to reveal that his HBO show would be sponsoring the upcoming videos of a YouTube channel called Jelle’s Marble Run.
Check out Jelle’s Marble Run on YouTube
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They then showed some incredible clips taken from the YouTube channel.
My interest was peaked by this, and I decided to go to the channel and check out what all the fuss was about.
Well, I suppose the rest is history.
Quickly, I realised that I had been watching about an hour of marbles racing one another.
It wasn’t just that. It was the incredible attention to detail the channel had taken to make it feel like you were really watching racing on TV.
Watching some of Jelle’s Marble Run’s videos is a lot like watching Formula One.
A lot of it is down to the incredible action, the tracks and the commentary.
I think it’s the commentary that makes these videos really special.
There’s nothing more therapeutic than watching marbles race
I’ve been spending far too much time watching marbles race on YouTube and I don’t regret it – Credit: Pexels
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Most of the videos on the channel are commented by Greg Woods, who’s got the perfect commentator’s voice.
They’ve also been doing a series of videos called Marbula-E (love that name), and in those videos, Greg is joined by Jack Nichols who’s also got an excellent voice for sports commentating.
So, I ended up watching more than just marbles racing one another on this channel.
They also have videos in which marbles compete in their version of the Olympics.
They come up with great team names, and they also give the marbles names and their own backstories.
Honestly, this channel is genius, and I’m pretty sure their subscriber numbers have skyrocketed since they were featured on Last Week Tonight.
They currently sit at 1.14 million subscribers, and I’m pretty sure that number will continue to grow.
It’ll probably get another jump when the special Last Week Tonight sponsored videos drop and they’re then featured yet again on the HBO show.
However, you can only watch marbles race and compete against one another for so long.
So, this was when I happened upon another channel which I became obsessed with – 3DBotMaker.
This is all John Oliver’s fault!
This all started after I watched John Oliver on Last Week Tonight – Credit: HBO
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This channel is quite a lot smaller than Jelle’s Marble Run, but you wouldn’t know it from watching the videos.
They currently sit at 270K subscribers, and this deserves to be a channel with a couple million subscribers.
The videos are brilliantly made, as are the tracks.
The commentators are also just as good as the ones on Jelle’s Marble Run.
This is a much more ‘American’ style of commentating. Think more Nascar and less Formula One, but I still love it.
I also love the fact that this channel uses mostly Hotwheels toy cars rather than marbles.
It makes the whole thing feel a bit more genuine.
The other aspect of this channel that I think puts it slightly above Jelle’s Marble Run in my book is the sound design.
You have to watch 3DBotMaker on YouTube
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They add real car sound effects, and it makes it all feel like you’re watching real cars race one another.
This channel also gives their drivers backstories, and I’ve discovered that I can watch their videos for hours on end.
If you’re struggling with the lack of live sports at the moment, I think these two YouTube channels can help you get your sports fix.
That is, until everything eventually goes back to some kind of normality.
What do you make of this news?
Have you been watching marbles and toy cars race on YouTube?
Let us know in the comments below.
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