Jim Rosenthal

From Frikipedia

Former member of Sesame Street and former presenter of ITV's F1 coverage. Has the kind of smile that terrifies young children and turns people to stone.

Friki actually quite liked his method of presenting F1. He freely admitted that he knew almost nothing about the sport before he was asked to front the coverage, which ITV had snapped up the rights for before realising that the only alternative presenter they had available was Trevor McDonald. Because of his relative ignorance, he opened up the sport to casual fans, the kind of people who do stuff during the week instead of obsessing over wing angles and fuel loads while replaying the previous Grand Prix over and over again in an attempt to burn every soul-destroying lap onto their retinas.

For casual fans, Jim would reduce everything to their level. So when Tony Jardine spent five minutes prattling on about aerodynamic efficiency versus complicated pit lane gamesmanship, before rounding it off with a poorly concieved in-joke from his days as Jordan's coffee boy, Jim would simply look slightly bemused and unimpressed, and say something that roughly translated as "what the hell are you talking about, you poorly dressed excuse for a studio analyst?" and force him to explain everything properly.

Also, because he was an outsider infiltrating F1's soggy bosom like a tapeworm, he had no qualms with asking proper questions in his interviews with Max Mosely or Bernie and making them squirm. Questions that even Martin Brundle would baulk at asking on his pointless celebrity interviews he disguises as a "grid walk".

Alas, Jim has gone, replaced by the smarm-fest that is Steve Rider. Now fronts ITV's sporadic boxing coverage, usually some fight between Amir Khan and a fat welder from Bermondsey, but still maintains his ability to beam into the camera and say "Welcome to what promises to be a fantastic evening" whilst staring at you as if he is reading your deepest, innermost fears.