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.
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]
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]
Burden is married to journalist Luke Mendham and has four children. [7] The family lives in the Cheshire countryside near Knutsford. [1] [8]