Formula 1 on BBC TV Sport

Friday 28 March saw the start of the 2009 Formula One World Championship and it also marked the return of F1 to BBC Television, after an absence of 12 years, when F1 races were covered by ITV.

The new-look coverage promises to be the most comprehensive in the history of the sport, with all on-track sessions brought live through TV, Radio, Red Button, broadband and of course BBC iPlayer for any of those missed moments.

F1 fans will be able to customise their viewing experience through BBC Sport s multiplatform offering with options such as: split-screen action, live leaderboard, in-car cameras, choice of commentary, live online streaming, live text, interactive forums, circuit guides and blogs.

BBC TV highlights include:

All races live on BBC One, and BBC One HD

Every qualifying session live on BBC One (Brazil on BBC Two)

All races and qualifying sessions that finish before 1000 to have full repeat on terrestrial TV later in the day

One-hour evening highlights programme on BBC Three (1900 for all races except Brazil)

BBC TV Sports Jake Humphrey will anchor the coverage, with David Coulthard and Eddie Jordan providing expert race insight and analysis. The presentation team will be on location at every race coming live from the Paddock or trackside. Award-winning commentator Martin Brundle and Jonathan Legard will call the race, while Lee McKenzie and Ted Kravitz will bring all of the interviews and action from the pits.

For those viewers who miss the live coverage of the race, there will be another chance to watch the all of the action from start to finish. All races and qualifying sessions that finish before 10am will play out in full later in the day, on terrestrial TV. If viewers would rather tune in for the key parts of the action, they can wait until the evening for a one-hour highlights programme on BBC Three (1900 for all races except Brazil).

From the 2012 season, the UK TV broadcasting rights for Formula One were shared between the “free to air” BBC and the Sky Sports subscription service.

Initially the BBC had the broadcast rights for all races live. However, due to budget restraints and cost cutting, the BBC went to Sky Sports to discuss a shared rights deal. Sky Sports F1 HD. As part of the deal half of the races and qualifying sessions will remain live on the BBC, including key races such at the British Grand Prix, and the final race of the season. Extensive highlights will be available for those races to which the BBC does not have live coverage. Sky Sports will show every race live. As a result of this deal, Martin Brundle and Ted Kravitz moved from the BBC to join Sky Sports F1.

Suzi Perry took over BBC hosting duties when Jake Humphrey joined BT Sport.

Although  the BBC’s F1 contract ran until the end of the 2018 season, it decided to “reluctantly” end its Formula 1 television contract three years early as part of savings across the corporation.

Channel 4 will take on the BBC’s F1 broadcast rights from the 2016 season.

Formula 1 on BBC TV 

Live Formula 1 on BBC TV in 2012
Live Formula 1 on BBC TV in 2013
Live Formula 1 on BBC TV in 2014
Live Formula 1 on BBC TV in 2015