The biggest awards in the sporting calendar, the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, is to be held for the first time in Aberdeen at the P&J Live.
Presented by Gary Lineker, Clare Balding and Gabby Logan, the awards will take place at the city’s world-class new entertainment venue on December 15.
This will only be the second time the awards have been held in Scotland after Glasgow’s SSE Hydro hosted it in 2014.
Broadcast live from the Granite City on BBC One and BBC One HD, the ceremony will celebrate a huge year of sport, attracting thousands to Aberdeen’s P&J Live – with even more people tuning in to watch the awards.
Head of entertainment at P&J Live Louise Stewart said: “This is a game changer for the venue and the city. We are ecstatic to be working with the BBC Sports team and the wider Aberdeen stakeholder group on this flagship event.
“Hosting an event such as this was absolutely at the forefront of the city’s vision when planning this transformational project.”
Director of BBC Sport Barbara Slater added: “It’s been an extraordinary year of sport so far with many incredible moments and surely more to come. I have no doubt Aberdeen will be an excellent host city to help us celebrate them.”
Nine prestigious titles are up for grabs including Sports Personality of the Year, Greatest Sporting Moment, World Sport Star of the Year, Coach of the Year, Young Sports Personality of the Year and the Lifetime Achievement award, to name a few.
This year has already seen several ground-breaking sporting moments, including the England men’s team winning the Cricket World Cup for the first time, the longest singles final in history at Wimbledon between Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, the England football team getting to the semi-finals of the Women’s World Cup and Tiger Woods achieving his fifth Masters title.
And Aberdeen itself is the birthplace of many sporting legends including Denis Law and Paul Lawrie. The city is of course also home to Aberdeen FC where Sir Alex Ferguson first made his name as a manager with incredible success.
Alongside the main event, the inaugural BBC Festival of Sport will take place in Aberdeen on December 13-14, giving local schoolchildren and members of the public the opportunity to try a variety of sporting activities with BBC Sport talent on-hand to offer tips and encouragement.
Nominations for this year’s Sports Personality of the Year Unsung Hero Award opened today.
The awards will be supported by Made by Sport, an organisation that champions the power of sport to change lives and raises vital funds to support it. It celebrates individuals that give up their own free time to help others take part in grassroots sports.
General tickets go on sale on Friday October 11 at 9am from pandjlive.com.
Nominations for the Unsung Hero of the Year can be made by visiting bbc.co.uk/unsunghero.
