Rachel Burden
British radio presenter
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Rachel Mary Ann Cecilia Burden (born 22 January 1975 in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, England) is a newsreader, radio news reporter and presenter. She has presented the BBC Radio 5 Live weekday breakfast show since 2011. She is also one of the main weekend presenters of BBC Breakfast.
Early life
The fourth of five children,[1] Burden is the only daughter of former BBC journalist Paul Burden and his wife,[2] and the niece of the actor Hugh Burden. She went to school from 1987-93 at Wycombe High School, a girls' grammar school in High Wycombe, taking English, History, Politics and Practical Music at A-level.[3][4] After graduating from Trinity College, Dublin, she studied broadcast journalism at Cardiff University.[1]
Career
Burden began her career as a reporter at BBC Radio Suffolk, and 15 months later joined BBC Radio Bristol where she co-hosted the early morning breakfast show, working alongside Nigel Dando, the brother of murdered presenter Jill Dando. She joined Radio 5 Live in 2003, the day before her father retired from the BBC.[5] She took over the weekday breakfast show from Shelagh Fogarty in May 2011, alongside co-presenter Nicky Campbell. Burden made her debut on the BBC Breakfast television programme as a relief presenter on Saturday 23 August 2015.[6]
In May 2025, Burden presented VE Day 80: We Were There; a BBC2 documentary which was part of the BBC's VE Day 80th anniversary celebrative programming.[7]