Jeff Stelling has hailed his Celebrity Race Across the World co-stars Princess and Junior Andre as “the nicest people in the world” ahead of the new BBC series, which launched on Wednesday, October 28 at 8pm on BBC One and iPlayer.
The veteran broadcaster appeared alongside his son Matt, and the siblings, on The One Show the same day to discuss their 7,500km trek from Kuching in Malaysia to Melbourne, Australia. According to the Daily Star, Stelling’s praise was effusive, and presenter Clara Amfo said she could “feel the love” radiating from the four contestants.
Who is competing in Celebrity Race Across the World 2026?
The new series pits four pairs against each other on a route the BBC describes as its most demanding yet. Starting in Kuching, in the Malaysian state of Sarawak on the island of Borneo, the teams must cross prehistoric jungles and pass through five checkpoints across three countries and two continents before reaching the finish line in Melbourne, as reported by the Mirror.
Stelling and his son Matt are racing alongside Princess and Junior Andre, the children of Katie Price and Peter Andre, who are competing as a sibling duo. They are joined by singer Ella Eyre and her childhood friend Nana, and by Sam Ryder, the singer-songwriter who represented the UK at Eurovision, travelling with his friend and tour manager Kaz.
The format remains the programme’s familiar conceit: famous faces and their loved ones traverse enormous distances on tight budgets, and the spectacle of their discomfort becomes prime-time entertainment. There is a tension worth naming here. The show frames itself as an adventure of resilience and human connection, but it also asks us to consume landscapes and communities across the Global South as a backdrop for celebrity self-discovery. Sarawak and its rainforests are not empty stages; they are territories shaped by colonial extraction and, today, by deforestation-driven capitalism that the programme’s glossy description does not mention.
Princess and Junior Andre on carving out their own identity
The siblings have been explicit about wanting to step out of their parents’ considerable shadow. Princess, 19, who works as a social media influencer and model and has starred in her own ITV reality programme, The Princess Diaries, since 2025, addressed the comparisons directly.
“Everything we do, we get compared to our parents but we actually have our own thing that we do.”
Junior, 21, who has pursued a music career like his father, was blunt about the stakes.
“We’ve kind of got a lot to prove. I’m so excited for this. I cannot wait to do this, we’re going to win.”
Their comments, reported by the BBC’s own preview of the series, speak to something familiar to anyone who has grown up under public scrutiny: the pressure to be legible only through your family, your lineage, your inherited privilege or your inherited stigma. Princess and Junior were born into fame and its resources, and that matters. But their insistence on their own agency is a small, recognizable act of self-definition, the kind young people perform constantly against narratives written for them by others.
According to the Independent’s profile of the 2026 cast, Junior admitted he signed up immediately without ever having watched the show, while Princess needed more persuading. “I didn’t really know what I was letting myself in for, but I think Princess needed a bit more convincing,” he said.
Stelling’s verdict and the show’s emotional register
Stelling, best known for decades of football broadcasting, has positioned himself as the elder statesman of the group, and his warmth toward the Andre siblings set the tone of the promotional circuit. The One Show interview, hosted by Vernon Kay and Clara Amfo, leaned heavily on camaraderie rather than competition, an editorial choice that tells us how the BBC wants the series received: as feel-good television in a moment when the licence fee itself is under sustained political attack.
It is worth asking what this programming does culturally. Celebrity reality television thrives on the fiction that anyone can be tested, humbled and transformed on screen. But the material conditions of the participants are wildly unequal, and the show rarely interrogates them. A former football presenter, a Eurovision star and two young adults raised inside the reality TV machine are not representative of the Britain watching them, and the programme’s framing of travel as universally available erases the borders, visa regimes and financial barriers that confine most people, especially migrants and working-class communities, to far more modest horizons.
What happened last series?
The 2025 edition of Celebrity Race Across the World was won by Roman Kemp and his sister Harleymoon, who became the first team to reach the Península de La Guajira in Colombia. Their victory involved a 5,900km journey along the Caribbean and Pacific coastlines of Central America, ending with a 4x4 expedition, a boat journey and a scramble up a cliffside.
“We did it,” Roman Kemp declared at the finish. Harleymoon responded: “I don’t understand that we’ve come first, let’s write our names before they get here to make sure it’s true.” Looking back on the win, she added: “I’m so overwhelmed, I don’t know whether to be sick, to celebrate. I feel in shock.”
Frequently asked questions
When does Celebrity Race Across the World 2026 start?
The series began on Wednesday, October 28 at 8pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Who is in the Celebrity Race Across the World 2026 cast?
The cast includes Jeff Stelling and his son Matt, Princess and Junior Andre, Ella Eyre and her friend Nana, and Sam Ryder with his friend and tour manager Kaz.
What is the route for the 2026 series?
The teams travel roughly 7,500km from Kuching in Malaysia, through Borneo and across three countries and two continents, aiming to finish in Melbourne, Australia.
Who won the previous series?
Roman Kemp and his sister Harleymoon won the 2025 series, reaching the Península de La Guajira in Colombia after a 5,900km race across Central America.