Channel 4 has unveiled its line-up of presenters and reporters for its comprehensive coverage of the London 2012 Paralympic Games this summer, featuring top sports broadcasters, former Paralympians and new disabled talent.
It will be the biggest broadcasting event in Channel 4’s 30-year history and the most extensive coverage ever dedicated to the Paralympic Games by a UK broadcaster.
Channel 4 will clear its schedules across the network for all eleven days of the Games, screening more than 150 hours of coverage, and in line with the channel’s vision on winning the broadcast rights to the Games, half of the presenters and reporters in the line-up will be disabled.
Peak time live coverage of the Games on Channel 4 will be fronted by renowned BBC sports broadcaster Clare Balding and TV presenter and former Paralympic wheelchair basketball medallist Ade Adepitan.
Balding has previously presented both the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Sydney in 2000, Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008 for the BBC, while Adepitan was involved in the corporation’s output during the last two Paralympics.
Adepitan told Media Guardian: “I think it’s fantastic. For me, if Channel 4 hadn’t won the rights I don’t think it would have been possible for this amount of disabled talent to show their skills on TV.
“I think they’ll add another layer and another perspective, and they’ll be able to say things which no able-bodied presenter would be able to say.
“We’re all working really hard at the moment, and have been for six or seven months, honing our skills. It was a really bold decision, not just to show the Paralympics but to portray people with disability as widely and as broadly as they can.”
Disabled Australian comedian Adam Hills, who hosted ABC’s live coverage of the 2008 Paralympic Games Ceremonies in Beijing, will bring a combination of experience and quick wit to the regular evening highlights show.
Rick Edwards, who has fronted ‘That Paralympic Show’ and Channel 4’s athletics coverage, will also take up a key role in the presenter line-up, along with former Olympic triple-jump champion Jonathan Edwards.
Seven new faces in the line-up will come from Channel 4’s talent search for disabled talent in 2010, including Irish presenter Daráine Mulvihill and former Royal Marine Arthur Williams, who will each anchor daytime studio coverage.
They will be joined by new reporters on-location at the various Paralympic venues – former Paralympic swimmer Rachael Latham, sports reporter and wheelchair basketball player Jordan Jarrett-Bryan, former carpenter Martin Dougan, researcher Liam Holt and sports journalist Alex Brooker.
All seven were chosen from hundreds of hopefuls in the talent search and put through rigorous training.
Long-standing Channel 4 News anchor Jon Snow will anchor the channel’s coverage of the Paralympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies.
Snow has been the face of Channel 4 News since 1989 and has reported on some of the world’s most historic events, including the release of Nelson Mandela and the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Kelly Cates and Georgie Bingham also join as presenters and between them have an impressive resume of sports broadcasting experience including Sky Sports, ESPN, ITV and Setanta.
Additional on-location reporters include Sonja McLaughlan, former Paralympic middle-distance runner Danny Crates, former Paralympic swimmer Giles Long and ex-Olympic 400m runner Iwan Thomas.
Details of the wider team, including commentators and pundits, will be released at a later date.
As the official UK broadcaster, Channel 4’s coverage of the London 2012 Paralympic Games will be on air across the channel’s network until midnight each day during the Games-time period as the channel commits to ‘all day every day’ programming.
The team of presenters, who will broadcast in pairs, will co-host more than 150 hours of Games-time action across multiple platforms including Channel 4, More4 and online.
“Being the broadcaster of the London 2012 Paralympic Games is a huge privilege and an opportunity for us to really make a difference to the perception of disability and disability sport in this country,” said Jay Hunt, Chief Creative Officer at Channel 4.
“I’m thrilled to announce this brilliant and carefully selected team of presenters and reporters; a mix of broadcasting heavyweights and new faces including disabled talent.
“Our coverage will contain in-depth analysis and intelligent, frank and thought-provoking insight from people who are equipped to bring these incredible but little-understood sports to a broad mainstream audience and help us to make this the biggest Paralympic Games ever.”
Newly-commissioned breakfast and teatime shows will air each day of the Games, bringing both live sport and highlights to audiences of all ages at all times of the day.
The channel’s Paralympic coverage will be co-produced by Sunset & Vine and IMG Sports Media, two of the UK’s leading specialist sports production companies, drawing on their considerable experience of multi-discipline sporting events.
“We will be on air before the sport of the day begins and until the last flag has been rolled up and put away with all the action, expert comment and analysis and specially commissioned breakfast and tea time shows,” added Hunt.
“This is a 400% increase on the coverage the Paralympics has ever received in this country and will make it impossible to ignore.”
Coverage, including of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, will span both Channel 4 and More 4, to accommodate regular programming, while viewers will also be able enjoy live streaming and daily highlights on Channel 4’s new interactive Paralympics website.
The new site channel4.com/Paralympics will also include profiles of all Paralympic athletes competing in the Games and offer educational information on the classification system that exists in Paralympic sport, with the aim of creating household names of British Paralympic athletes and educating the nation.
Over the course of 2012, Channel 4 will also be broadcasting the BT Paralympic World Cup and a range of Paralympic programming including a fourth series of ‘That Paralympic Show’ and the final episodes of their ‘Best of British’ series.
