BBC delays start of the new series of The Great British Bake Off until August 24 to avoid clash with the Olympic Games
Bosses worry that if Olympic fever grips the nation, viewing figures for the hit baking show could fall
THE Great British Bake Off will start later in the year than ever before — to avoid a scheduling clash with the Rio 2016 Olympics.
Current plans mean the new BBC1 series will air on August 24, a massive 19 days after it started last year on August 5.
The Olympics’ closing ceremony will be three days earlier on August 21 at the Maracana Stadium in Rio, Brazil.
Bosses are keen to for the show — starring judges Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry — to get off to a good start after it pulled a huge 12 million viewers in on average last series.
And they worry that if Olympic fever grips the nation then viewing figures could be affected.
The latest it has ever started was August 20, back in series four which was won by Frances Quinn. It normally starts in the first or second week of the month.
A production source said: “Bake Off is a juggernaut unlike anything else on the TV. It pulls in huge, huge viewing figures but the bosses still have to think practically.
“The Olympics is a big deal for the Beeb and they are basically wiping their prime-time schedule to show all of the action.
“The Bake Off is the one of the pinnacles of their year so they’re not going to waste it. The view is if it starts on ten million plus viewers, it’ll stay there all series.
“It just makes sense for it to start after the Olympic action has finished.”
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Last year’s final drew in a massive 13.4million viewers as Nadiya Hussain was crowned the winner.
The previous year’s final, won by Nancy Birtwhistle, pulled in an equally impressive 12.3 million.
Bake Off fans are not the only ones who will be affected by the Olympics.
Kids channel CBBC HD will have less capacity due to the sheer amount of live footage being shown, meaning some viewers may lose the channel altogether.
The Beeb also says that due to “unavoidable technical reasons”, the HD versions of three channels — CBBC, BBC4 and CBeebies — will be affected too meaning some users will have to retune their Freeview boxes.
The Beeb added: “Normal service for CBBC HD will resume after 23rd August and you will still receive the SD version throughout. We apologise for any inconvenience this causes.
“For unavoidable technical reasons, on the three HD channels that are moving any series links that have been set will not record – so viewers should reset their recordings to the SD version of those channels in order to maintain continued recordings during the Olympic Games.”