Claudia Winkleman has announced that she would leave her BBC Radio 2 show after three years.
The Strictly Come Dancing host, 51, will leave the show in March to spend more time with her children, Jake, 19, Matilda, 15, and Arthur, 10, whom she has with her film producer husband, Kris Thykier, 51.
She explained her decision to leave the BBC programme, saying, ‘The reality is my children are growing up inordinately fast, so I have chosen to follow them about at home before they go for forever.’
On today’s episode, the Traitors host informed listeners that comedian Romesh Ranganathan will take over as host of the 10am to 1pm slot in April.
On her replacement, Claudia said: ‘I couldn’t be happier that Romesh is taking over Saturday mornings on Radio 2. He is brilliantly laugh out loud funny, and I’ll listen every single week as my kids beg me to leave them alone.’
She also said it had been a ‘privilege’ to be on Radio 2 and will miss ‘our amazing guests, our brilliant listeners and the one and only Sally Traffic.’
‘I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who works on the show, I will continue to visit with badly made biscuits and will pester the bosses to present the odd special,’ Claudia continued.
Romesh, who presently broadcasts a show on the station from midnight to 1 a.m. on Saturdays, expressed surprise at his meteoric climb from maths instructor to famous radio personality.
The 45-year-old said: ‘In my many years working as a maths teacher thinking ‘what would happen if I gave this up’, I never imagined I’d be sandwiched between Dermot O’Leary and Steve Wright on the UK’s most popular radio station every Saturday morning.’
Father-of-three Romesh joked: I’m grateful to Claud for wanting to spend more time with her kids, and enabling me to spend less time with mine, and I look forward to finding out what the nation is up to at that time, as well as speaking to some familiar faces. It’s going to be fun. Probably.’
But don’t worry, Claudia fans: she still has numerous projects in the works at the BBC, including co-hosting Strictly Come Dancing with Tess Daly.
She will also be preparing for the second season of The Traitors, which will premiere next year after the first season captivated the nation and earned a plethora of top TV accolades.
The immensely fascinating reality programme has 22 strangers joined together in a castle in the Scottish Highlands as they face daily challenges to build up the cash prize, but there is a huge twist – there are three Traitors among the Faithfuls.
Each night at the roundtable, the group decides who to kill, while the traitors choose who to send home at their own secret meetings with Claudia, with the Traitors winning if any of them remain at the end.
