ITV confirms Rider, Goodman
ITV Sport has confirmed that Steve Rider and Louise Goodman will continue to present its coverage of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship in 2012.
Rider will continue to front the extensive coverage on ITV4 - with his role not clashing with commitments on the new Sky Sports F1 channel - while Goodman will continue to work in the paddock conducting interviews with drivers after races.
The pair join commentators Toby Moody and Tim Harvey in the ITV Sport line-up for the season ahead.
"The viewers not only have a wide variety of car to look forward to but also, in 2012, the increased spectacle that the latest Next Generation Touring Car regulations will bring with turbocharged engines and flaming exhausts," Rider said. "In some ways it's taking an element of the iconic RS500 days with their turbos and performance in the early Nineties - an era which people still recall with great affection - and adding it to the modern-day BTCC with its many great different makes and models of car. I'm delighted that we have Toby on board and, given ITV's incredibly strong commitment to the championship, this year's BTCC is going to make for compelling viewing on television sets up and down the country.
"It's also terrific that ITV remains a genuine alternative for people looking beyond Formula 1 for another form of highly professional and exciting motor sport in Britain. The network's coverage of the BTCC is something of a perfect marriage between high street motoring and the high octane end of motor sport. The championship always comes with a great noise and fury and this will likely be even more so the case under the new regulations."
Goodman added: "I always look forward to the start of the new BTCC season when we can start getting stuck into producing the shows - and, looking at the car and driver line-ups for 2012, this season promises to deliver all the drama, excitement and action that we've come to expect from the BTCC. It'll be a pleasure working alongside Steve once more - he's the ultimate professional - as it will the drivers, although one can never quite anticipate just what some of them might do on camera as I discovered last year! Having Toby on-board is also excellent news - he is a class act in the commentary booth and he and Tim will make for a great pairing."
