Clare Balding

Balding's well-documented aristocratic lineage on her mother's side can be seen in records that TheGenealogist has identified in research. Researchers found Balding's maternal line reveals that she is the great-granddaughter of Sir Malcolm Bullock whose sexuality was investigated in her episode of the Who Do You Think You Are? programme first broadcast in July 2017. Balding's paternal grandfather Gerald Barnard Balding Sr, was a 10-goal polo player who travelled to play polo in America in the 1920s when he was in his 20s. Outbound passenger lists on a genealogy website include Balding's grandfather and it was at this time that Gerald Balding Sr met and later married the American heiress, Eleanor Hoagland.

Balding was involved in a copy-control controversy in 2017, when it was alleged that she or her agent rewrote part of an interview that she gave to Saga magazine, provoking the journalist Ginny Dougary to remove her byline from the interview. According to Dugarry, Balding removed sections of the text and inserted promotional material about her new book, as well as details of her hosting of the women's European football championships and the words "And indeed she [Balding] sparkles all the way through the photo shoot," despite Dougary commenting that this was not the case and that Balding was rather "a brisk, jolly-hockey-sticks type". In a statement, Saga claimed that it had not given Balding copy control and that the interview was edited in conjunction with the author.

Balding's matrilineal great-great-grandparents Edward Stanley, 17th Earl of Derby and Lady Alice Montagu both descended from Henry VII. The earl's lineage can also be traced back to Sir Thomas Frankland. This makes Balding an 11-times-great-granddaughter of Oliver Cromwell.

In 2015, Balding became an ambassador for Southampton FC's official charity, the Saints Foundation.

In 2014, Balding publicly backed Hacked Off and its campaign towards UK press self-regulation by "safeguarding the press from political interference while also giving vital protection to the vulnerable."

She has served as one of the presenters on BBC Sports Personality of the Year. Balding was the presenter of Good Morning Sunday on BBC Radio 2 from January 2013 to November 2017; leaving the show due to schedule changes which would not allow her to continue to present the programme and do other work. Balding also presented a Saturday night quiz show for BBC1 called Britain's Brightest, which began in January 2013. She was a senior presenter on Channel 4 Racing, from 2013 to 2016, predominantly fronting coverage of major festivals such as Cheltenham and Royal Ascot.

Balding was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2013 Birthday Honours for services to broadcasting and journalism. In the same year, Balding was presented with the special BAFTA for her work on the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics.

In February 2013 she was assessed as being one of the 100 most powerful women in the UK by Woman's Hour on BBC Radio 4. and also won the award for Sports Presenter at the Television and Radio Industries Club Awards.

From February to March 2012 she presented Sport and the British on BBC Radio 4, a thirty-part series looking at the impact of sports on British life.

Balding was a lead presenter on Channel 4's Paralympics TV coverage. In August 2012 it was reported that Balding would be presenting Channel 4's racing coverage, while still retaining an option to work for the BBC on non-racing programmes such as rugby league.

In October 2012, she appeared before an All Party Parliamentary Group on women's sport, with Katherine Grainger, Hope Powell and Tanni Grey-Thompson. "Women having freedom to play sport leads directly to women having political freedom," said Balding. In 2013, to mark the centenary of Emily Wilding Davison's fatal intervention in the 1913 Derby, Balding presented a documentary about Davison for Channel 4 called Secrets of the Suffragettes. Also in 2013, she presented a BBC documentary about the Queen called The Queen – a Passion for Horses. Other factual documentaries for the BBC have included Britain By Bike, Operation Wild, and Britain's Hidden Heritage.

She signed a deal with Viking Press to write an autobiography entitled My Animals and Other Family, which was published in September 2012. My Animals and Other Family reached Number One in The Sunday Times Bestseller list and has been translated into Italian, Mandarin and Hungarian. Her second book, Walking Home: My Family and other Ramblings, was published in September 2014.

In December 2012, she was awarded the "Biography/Autobiography of the Year" award of the National Book Awards for My Animals and Other Family.

She also won an achievement award from the UK chapter of the Women in Film and Television in 2012 for her coverage of the Olympics and Paralympics.

Balding was awarded the 2012 Sports Journalists' Association's annual British Sports Journalism Award for Sports Broadcaster of the Year (BBC and Channel 4).

Her other awards include Attitude Awards TV Personality of the Year 2012, TRIC Sports Presenter of the Year 2013, British Equestrian Federation Outstanding Journalist of the Year 2014 and First Women Awards Lifetime Achievement 2015. Plus awards from Red magazine, Tatler and the Horserace Writers' Association.

In August 2011 Balding joined BBC's Countryfile, temporarily replacing Julia Bradbury while Bradbury was on maternity leave, co-hosting the show with Matt Baker. Bradbury returned in February 2012.

In 2010, Balding presented a BBC TV series called Britain By Bike that retraced some of Harold Briercliffe's British cycle tours.

In July 2010, Balding made a complaint to the Press Complaints Commission over an article by writer A. A. Gill in The Sunday Times that she felt had mocked her sexuality and appearance and for which the newspaper refused to apologize. The PCC found in her favour, judging that AA Gill had "refer[red] to the complainant's sexuality in a demeaning and gratuitous way". In 2014, she was named in the top 10 on the World Pride Power list.

In 2010, Balding became a patron of the British Thyroid Foundation.

On 29 May 2009, Balding announced that she had thyroid cancer. She promised to be back on television covering the Epsom Derby, by the following Saturday. On 21 August 2009, she announced that the radioactive iodine had been successful with no signs of the cancer having spread.

After Liam Treadwell's Grand National victory on 4 April 2009, Balding interviewed him and made fun of his apparently bad teeth. Balding later clarified on BBC's Have I Got News For You quiz that she believed Treadwell, who suffered from microdontia and hypodontia, to have had his teeth "kicked out" by a horse, a common injury suffered by jockeys, apologising again for her error. However, Treadwell stated that he was pleased with her comment, as a dentist offered to fix his teeth at no cost. "It was the best thing Clare ever said," Treadwell said.

Balding has been a presenter on Sport Relief since its inception in 2002. She also participated in a celebrity edition of The Apprentice to raise money for charity. Sport Relief Does The Apprentice is part of the BBC's annual charity initiative and aired on 12 and 14 March 2008. "The Girls' team", which also included Louise Redknapp, Jacqueline Gold, Kirstie Allsopp and Lisa Snowdon, won the contest, raising over £400,000 from ticket sales and sales on the night of the big event at their shop.

Balding formalised her relationship with Alice Arnold, then a BBC Radio 4 continuity announcer and newsreader, in September 2006 by entering into a civil partnership. The couple live with their Tibetan terrier, Archie. In April 2015, she and Arnold married in a private ceremony.

She also presents the Lord Mayor's Show as well as other live events for the BBC, such as Trooping the Colour and New Year's Eve. Clare has presented coverage of Crufts for the BBC from 2004 – 2009 and for Channel 4 since 2013.

Balding won the Royal Television Society's "Sports Presenter of the Year" in 2003 and “Presenter” in 2012. Also in 2003, she won the "Racing Journalist of the Year Award" and has followed up with the award for "Racing Broadcaster of the Year".

She also presents the walking programme Ramblings for BBC Radio 4 where she walks and talks with one or more devotees of a particular route, area or activity and has, for example, walked sections of the Lyke Wake Walk and Dales Way for the programme. Clare worked on 5 Live's Wimbledon coverage from 1995–2014 and in 2015 presented BBC2's Wimbledon Highlights programme. She has also presented coverage of The Boat Race for the BBC since 2010, including the first live coverage of the women's Boat Race on the Tideway in 2015.

Clare became a trainee with BBC National Radio in 1994, working on 5 Live, Radio 1 (presenting the sport on the Chris Evans Breakfast Show), Radio 2 and Radio 4. In June 1995, she made her debut as a television presenter, introducing highlights of Royal Ascot. The following year she began presenting live, and in December 1997 she became the BBC's lead horse racing presenter after the retirement of Julian Wilson, and has fronted coverage of the Grand National, infamously humiliating Liam Treadwell, Grand National winner 2009.

Clare Balding applied to read law at Christ's College, Cambridge, but failed her interview and realized that law was not what she most wanted to do. She later successfully applied to Newnham College, Cambridge, and read English. While at university she was President of the Cambridge Union Society in Easter 1992 and graduated in 1993 with a 2:1 honours degree.

From 1988 to 1993, Balding was a leading amateur flat jockey and Champion Lady Rider in 1990. Her memoir My Animals and Other Family documents her life growing up in a racing yard. It won the National Book Awards "Autobiography of the Year" in 2012.

Clare Victoria Balding OBE (born 29 January 1971) is a broadcaster, journalist and author. She currently presents for BBC Sport, Channel 4, BT Sport and formerly presented the religious programme Good Morning Sunday on BBC Radio 2.

Clare Balding has close family links to horse racing: her father, Ian Balding, trained Mill Reef, 1971 winner of The Derby, Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe and King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes; and her younger brother, Andrew Balding, trained Casual Look, the winner of the 2003 Epsom Oaks. The latter win led to a very emotional post-race interview with her brother. Her uncle Toby Balding trained winners in the Grand National, Cheltenham Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle. Furthermore, her maternal grandfather was the trainer Peter Hastings-Bass and her maternal uncle the 17th Earl of Huntingdon was once trainer to Queen Elizabeth II. Her maternal grandmother, Priscilla Hastings, is descended from the Earls of Derby and was one of the first women elected to membership of the Jockey Club.