Jeanette Kwakye fronts BBC's European Athletics coverage as Birmingham hosts a home championships

A home European Athletics Championships is broadcasting gold for the BBC — and this week Birmingham's showpiece has put the corporation's coverage, and its presenters, at the centre of the national conversation. Jeanette Kwakye fronts each morning's action, with Gabby Logan taking the evening sessions across BBC One, BBC Two and iPlayer.

The championships run from 10 to 16 August, and searches for the former sprinter's name spiked this week as viewers took to social media to debate the broadcaster's handling of the biggest sessions — from channel switches to interruptions — even as the track delivered, headlined by Romell Glave's stunning victory in the men's 100m.

At a glance

• The European Athletics Championships run in Birmingham from 10 to 16 August
• Jeanette Kwakye presents mornings; Gabby Logan fronts the evening sessions
• Coverage spans BBC One, BBC Two and iPlayer under a multi-year rights deal
• Analysis from Jess Ennis-Hill, Greg Rutherford and Jenny Meadows, with Steve Cram and Paula Radcliffe on commentary
• Britain's Romell Glave stunned the field to take the men's 100m title

From the blocks to the studio

Kwakye earned her place in the presenter's chair the hard way. A world-class sprinter who reached the Olympic 100m final in Beijing in 2008, she moved into broadcasting after injury ended her career, building a reputation across radio and television as one of the sharpest interviewers in British sport.

Fronting a home championships is the role her second career has been building towards — steering coverage that blends live finals with analysis from Jess Ennis-Hill, Greg Rutherford and Jenny Meadows, and commentary from Steve Cram, Steve Backley, Andrew Cotter, Colin Jackson and Paula Radcliffe.

The coverage debate

No major championships passes without a scheduling row, and Birmingham has had its share. Splitting sessions between BBC One, BBC Two and iPlayer keeps athletics on the biggest channels around news bulletins and other commitments, but every handover and interruption sends a slice of the audience to social media in protest.

The complaints trending alongside Kwakye's name this week are, in that sense, a backhanded compliment: viewers are watching in numbers large enough to be annoyed. The corporation's multi-year rights deal for the Europeans reflects its bet that free-to-air athletics still commands a national audience — and the noise suggests it does.

A home games delivering

On the track, Birmingham has given the broadcaster the storylines it needed. Romell Glave's 100m title — a stunning win in the championships' blue-riband event — gave British athletics its marquee moment, with the sprint squad's depth on show all week.

Home championships are rare and precious for a sport fighting for attention between Olympic cycles: full stands, prime-time finals and a generation of British athletes performing in front of family-priced tickets rather than distant time zones.

Athletics' free-to-air bargain

The BBC's continued grip on major athletics matters beyond this week. Free-to-air coverage is the sport's shop window for the next generation — the route by which a ten-year-old stumbles across a 100m final and joins a club on Monday.

That is the context for every scheduling gripe: the alternative to imperfect BBC coverage, as other sports have discovered, is often perfect coverage behind a paywall that nobody stumbles across at all.

What happens next

The championships run through Sunday 16 August, with finals stacked into the weekend's evening sessions fronted by Logan, and Kwakye steering each morning's qualifying and analysis.

For British athletics, the measure of Birmingham 2026 will be counted in medals and in September's club membership numbers alike. For the BBC, it will be counted in viewing figures — and, inevitably, in the next round of social-media scheduling complaints. In broadcasting as in sprinting, you only get criticised when you're in the race.