Coulthard to stay with the BBC

The BBC have confirmed that commentator David Coulthard will stay with the BBC Formula One team alongside presenter Jake Humphrey and pit lane reporter Lee McKenzie.

The news follows the announcement that Martin Brundle would be leaving the BBC for Sky Sports for the 2012 season.

There has yet to be an announcement regarding analyst Eddie Jordan or pit lane reporter Ted Kravitz, while BBC Radio 5 Live's lead commentator David Croft has been linked with a move to join Brundle on Sky Sports.

Next season the BBC will only be showing 10 events from the Formula One calendar live after an agreement with Sky Sports was agreed to share the television rights in the UK.

BBC head of Formula One coverage Ben Gallop told the press: 'We're really looking forward to 2012 and what promises to be another great year of Formula One on the BBC. With presentation from the track at every race, we'll be there every step of the way to tell the story of the season.

'Through a mix of live coverage and extended highlights, we'll have the best of the action from both on and off the track, plus all the news, analysis and big-name interviews.'

He also added that the race selections for the BBC and Sky came after various negotiations: 'Just to be clear, it wasn't the case that the BBC was simply able to select its preferred ten races to cover live - under the terms of our rights agreement, the allocation was decided through a negotiation with Sky, with each broadcaster able to prioritise specific choices within certain parameters.'

The BBC will show practice, qualifying and the race live from China, Spain, Monaco, Valencia, Silverstone, Belgium, Singapore, Korea, Abu Dhabi and Brazil.

The other events will be shown on the BBC via highlights packages.