Sky Sports F1 regular David Croft is not on duty in Barcelona this weekend, prompting a reshuffle of commentary talent. The BBC has confirmed its commentary duo for the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix after losing their main voice to Sky Sports for the weekend. Harry Benjamin will be commentating for Sky in place of Croft, who has chosen to take this weekend off and is expected instead to attend the Download music festival in the UK.
Sky's pool of on-air talent rotates over the course of a season, and Crofty has joined in with that in recent years, having taken three race weekends off in each of the last two campaigns. On both occasions, he missed the Emilia Romagna, Austrian and Azerbaijan Grands Prix. Imola is no longer on the calendar but, instead, Croft has decided to skip the trip to Catalonia this year.
And with Benjamin stepping up to fill in, as has regularly been the case over those last two seasons, the BBC has had to make backup plans of its own for its radio coverage of the events in Barcelona this weekend. It's been confirmed that former W Series driver Alice Powell will step up to lead the commentary for the first time. And she will be joined by 2024 F1 Academy champion Abbi Pulling, who has experience of co-commentary and on-air analysis. They also know each other very well, Powell being Pulling's manager.
"I'm really excited to lead my first F1 commentary, alongside Abbi," said Powell. "As well as dreaming of becoming a racing driver when I was a kid, I also wanted to become a commentator. Who would have thought that six-year-old Alice, who would pretend to be Murray Walker commentating on my own little race on my bike in the garden, would be having the chance to lead a BBC commentary many years later? A big thank you also to IMG and the BBC for this opportunity."
And Pulling added: "It's incredible to be doing Barcelona comms with BBC 5 live, especially as it's an all-female line-up with Alice and me. The important thing as well is that it's not just to tick a box. It is down to our experiences and involvement with the sport that we're in these positions, which continues to show how much sport is evolving. It's becoming more widely accepted not just to have women within the sport in these roles, but also to have the knowledge and be trusted by the listeners."
Pulling races in the GB3 series this year, considered the fourth tier of single-seater motorsport below FIA Formula 3. Last month, she became the first woman to win a GB3 race when she took victory from pole at the Circuit Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium.
Benjamin has been a rising star of the BBC's motorsport coverage in recent years and is the usual lead commentator on BBC Radio 5 Live for a Grand Prix. His talents have also been noticed by Sky in recent years and he first appeared on the commercial channel for a Sky Kids alternative broadcast of the 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix, before stepping into his substitute role for Croft the following year.
