The UK’s BBC public service broadcaster has renewed its TV coverage partnership of the elite Diamond League athletics series with a new multi-year deal.
The five-year partnership began on April 26 with the Xiamen meet, the first of the 2025 campaign, and will run through the 2029 edition of the series.
Through this deal, BBC will air 14 of the 15 annual athletics meets that comprise the Diamond League, with the remaining London Athletics Meet also to be aired by the BBC through a separate partnership with the UK Athletics body.
Coverage will be disseminated across the BBC’s linear TV channels, its iPlayer OTT service, the BBC Sport website, and accompanying social media platforms, with highlights also distributed across social media and digital platforms.
The UK public broadcaster has showcased the Diamond League since its inaugural edition in 2010, as the country has enjoyed moderate success in the competition, ranking fifth overall in terms of total individual event winners.
BBC already holds broadcast rights to several athletics events such as the Olympic Games, European Athletics Championships, World Athletics Championships, and, most recently, the London Marathon, which BBC renewed last week.
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By GlobalDataMedia rights for the Diamond League are held by major sports agency Infront, which also holds the production rights for the competition.
Elsewhere in UK athletics, the capital city of London is at the center of a bid to host the 2029 World Athletics Championships.
The Athletic Ventures company, which is comprised of the UK Athletics, Great Run Company, and London Marathon Events organizers, is behind the bid, with a formal expression of interest to be sent to the World Athletics governing body.
The bid will require £45 million ($59.8 million) of government funding to support the running of the event, but a feasibility study conducted suggested that hosting the event could bring £400 million of economic benefit to the UK.
London last hosted the World Championships in 2017, and in 2026, Birmingham, England, will host the European Championships.
Between now and 2029, two editions of the biennial World Athletics Championships will take place, in 2025 in Tokyo, Japan, and in Beijing, China, in 2027.
The centerpiece of the bid will naturally be the London Stadium, currently utilized as the home of soccer team West Ham, which was built as an athletics stadium prior to the 2012 Olympic Games and can host as many as 68,000 spectators.
