MotoGP: British Grand Prix to be broadcast live on ITV

ITV Sport has regained the rights to broadcast free-to-air MotoGP highlights, which will include live coverage of the French Grand Prix on Sunday, 16 May, on ITV4.

Fans in the UK will have the chance to catch the best action from every race on the Monday evening following each MotoGP race weekend on ITV4 and online via ITV Hub throughout the 2021 season.

The hour-long show, which will be shown in a primetime 8pm slot on ITV4, will give viewers a comprehensive recap of the best of the weekend’s racing, covering each of the Grand Prix classes – MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3.

As well as featuring the biggest names on the MotoGP grid, such as multiple world champions Marc Marquez and Valentino Rossi, and reigning world champion Joan Mir, ITV4’s highlights will include extra focus on the British riders in the paddock as the likes of Sam Lowes in Moto2 and John McPhee in Moto3 fight for their respective World Championships.

ITV4’s coverage will feature the race commentary provided by MotoGP’s world feed TV production, which is led by commentators Steve Day and Matthew Birt.

The first highlights programme will be shown on Monday, 29 March, featuring the best action from the season-opening Grand Prix of Qatar from the Losail International Circuit, which kicks off another exciting season of racing.

ITV4 previously broadcast highlights of the series between 2014 and 2016, before the rights switched to Channel 5 in 2017 and latterly Quest for the past two seasons.

Along with the return of MotoGP highlights, ITV’s motorsport coverage in 2021 will also include live coverage of the British Touring Car Championship and the new Extreme E series, as well as World Rally Championship highlights, plus coverage of the various Goodwood meetings throughout the year.

Live coverage of the series, including every practice session, qualifying and race day, will continue to be broadcast on BT Sport until at least 2024.

There’s plenty of weekend motor sport viewing on @itv4 – and this is the headline:#MotoGP pic.twitter.com/u5dBk9iKmX

— ITV Motorsport (@itvmotorsport) May 14, 2021

UPDATE: ITV4 will show live coverage of the French Grand Prix on Sunday, 16 May, which will be the first live MotoGP race to be broadcast on free-to-air television since 2013.

Series promoter Dorna made an official announcement ahead of the race weekend, with live coverage of the entire race day at Le Mans, the fifth round of this season’s championship, added to the ITV4 schedules.

ITV4’s coverage will use the world feed presentation and commentary team, led by Steve Day and Matt Birt with pit-lane reports from Simon Crafar, and will feature full live coverage of the Moto3, Moto2 and MotoGP races.

The race day will be the first live motorcycle racing to be broadcast on an ITV channel since 2007, in the days when the network covered British Superbikes, while the 2013 Valencia Grand Prix was the last MotoGP race to be shown live on free-to-air television, a race which brought the BBC’s decade-long coverage of the series to an end.

In addition to the French round, the British Grand Prix on 29 August will also be broadcast live and free-to-air, as first reported by Motorsport Broadcasting, but due to a clash with the British Touring Car Championship meeting on ITV4 that same day, the MotoGP race day at Silverstone will instead air on ITV’s main channel.

In a statement to Autosport, Dorna managing director Manel Arroyo said:

“The work that we are doing in UK together with BT Sport is to enlarge our community in the UK, a key territory for MotoGP. To offer the iconic French GP on ITV4 this weekend is one big step on it.

“The British GP that will be broadcast by ITV on free-to-air will be a crucial one to offer our sport to touch new fans. The fact that ITV is now one of our broadcaster partners in the UK together with BT Sport shows also that MotoGP became a more and more appealing sport for UK audiences.”

Scroll down for full details of the 2021 MotoGP race calendar and broadcast times for ITV4’s programmes. For more information about MotoGP, visit the official website – motogp.com.

For a full list of all forthcoming major motorsport events on the box, visit SOTB’s dedicated motorsport on TV listings page.

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MONDAY 29th MARCH

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