Ayo Akinwolere | Broadcaster
Since leaving Blue Peter in 2011, Ayo Akinwolere has demonstrated his diversity as a broadcaster, hosting many programmes for the BBC including Teens From a Small Island (2010) and Stammer School (2011). He was also the West Midlands presenter for the BBC Current Affairs show Inside Out (2016-2021), for which he won the Factual RTS Award and BBC Ruby Award for his documentary on extremism. In 2018, he co-presented the short documentary Untold Stories: A Black History which looked at the untold stories of African and Caribbean people who lived in the UK in the 19th and 20th Centuries.
He has reported for programmes including The Gabby Logan Show (2011-12), World of Weird (2016), Match of the Day (2017), and Football Focus (2018). He has also hosted The 100 Greatest Toys (2010), It’s a Dog’s Life (2017), Fort Boyard: Ultimate Challenge (2012-14), and 2000s: The Best of Bad TV (2015). As a celebrity guest, he has appeared on Ready Steady Cook (2007), The Weakest Link (2007), Celebrity Masterchef (2015), Pointless Celebrities (2012-21), Dancing on Ice (2012), and The Great Comic Relief Bake Off (2013).
As a broadcaster, he has worked across British television and radio stations, interviewing some of the world’s biggest stars, including Lewis Hamilton and Jessica Ennis-Hill. He is also a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s From Our Home Correspondent (2017). In 2022, he became the host of the Red Bull Why I Run podcast which celebrates the extraordinary and everyday stories of running. In 2023 he took over from Mark Chapman as the host of the Athletics Flagship Football podcast, bringing daily discussions from within the world of football.
Ayo Akinwolere | Writing
He has written for publications including The Daily Telegraph, Huffington Post and BBC Sport, touching on subjects such as sport, his career and male identity. Ayo is a keen traveller having visited over 120 cities worldwide. He is a keen photographer and his photographs have been printed in the children’s National Geographic collection and Vogue Bambini. He won the British Photography Award for Fine Art for his piece entitled ‘Great Britain’ which was a reaction to the changing landscape of global ethnicity. He also writes for the digital magazine The Major, a collective space for innovation, interviews and film.
Ayo Akinwolere | Sporting Career
Ayo is a regular host for sporting events such as the London Mini-Marathon, the South African World Cup, various football match commentary and the Olympic Torch Relay at the 2012 London Games, where he interviewed the likes of Usain Bolt, Lennox Lewis, Daley Thompson, Jane Torvill and Christopher Dean.
He is also passionate about rugby, presenting Channel 4’s coverage of the sport, as well as the lead anchor for Ireland’s test matches and the Saturday morning magazine show The Big Tackle. He can also be seen hosting Premier League Today, Autumn Nations for Amazon Prime, Golazo for CBS USA and Welcome to the Weekend, as well as fronting coverage of the Winter Olympics and Commonwealth Games 2022.
Ayo Akinwolere | Charity Work
Ayo is passionate about charity work and has worked extensively with the Street Child United World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, as well as working closely with the UK charity Body and Soul, which is dedicated to transforming the lives of children, teenagers and families living with, or affected by, HIV. In 2021 he was named the UK Ambassador for the homeless charity Crisis alongside actress Imelda Staunton. He has been working closely with The Princes Trust for many years, mentoring young people across Birmingham.
In 2011, Ayo Akinwolere set a world record for swimming in one of the deepest stretches of water on the planet. He swam five miles across the Palau Trench, an 8,000-meter deep abyss in the Pacific Ocean. He is the first person to swim across the deepest part of the trench and gained the record for the deepest location for an open water swim. It took him three and a half hours to complete the swim. More amazingly, just 10 weeks prior, he couldn’t swim and was terrified of open water.
In 2015, Ayo created THE SWIM CHALLENGE, a project looking to dismiss the belief that people of colour cannot swim. He took 15 non-swimming adults of various ethnic backgrounds and redesigned a swimming programme to teach them how to swim in just three months. The challenge was such a success, Ayo was later commissioned by BBC Get Inspire to document the project. Ayo has given keynote speeches to the Swim Teacher Association on the importance of diversity in swimming as a way to combat the increasing number of people who are unable to swim.
Ayo Akinwolere | Corporate Work
Following the Black Lives Matter protests sparked by the death of George Floyd in America, Ayo joined the Cultural Intelligence Consultancy’s Cultural Agility Session. Ayo, along with other presenters and producers, use their experiences to re-work current embedded old-fashioned practices that may be racially or culturally discriminative. They work with leaders to create positive and forward-thinking working environments that will allow all employees, regardless of background, to exist authentically and drive productivity. They signed up to the Simon Sinek platform to give talks and webinars to some of the most powerful institutions and their leaders on the subject of cultural intelligence.
He also guest lectured on media and broadcasting at Universities across the UK.
Combining adaptability to almost any situation and investigative skill, Ayo is one of the BBC’s most loved faces. He is a versatile host, guiding audiences naturally and is able to create unique events.
Ayo Akinwolere | Clients
Clients: Auditoire (Paris), BBC, BFI, British Airways, the British Library, City University Birmingham, England Rugby, FA, Guinness, Havas, Honor Mobile Phones, HSBC, Huawei, Imagination, Kendal Mountaineering Festival, M&C Saachi, Major League Baseball, Natixis Investment Managers Summit, Natwest, Omicom Media Group, Open University, Radio Times, Royal Shakespeare Company, Santander, Shell, Sodexo Quality of Life Conference, Speedo, Swim Teacher Association, Tag Heuer, TBA, Toyota, WRG.
Ayo Akinwolere is also available for presenting opportunities on our sister site Great British Presenters.
Call +44 1753 439 289 or email Great British Speakers now to book TV Presenter Ayo Akinwolere for your corporate event.
