TV favourite Bernadine Oliver-Kerby talks about her new role.

TV favourite Bernadine Oliver-Kerby talks about her new roles, both on TV and radio. Sarah Nealon reports.

This year is turning out to be a big one for Bernadine Oliver-Kerby. She not only has a new radio gig but she is also fronting Prime’s in-studio Winter Olympics coverage.

During her long association with TVNZ, Oliver-Kerby was involved in covering the Summer Olympics but this is the first time she has presented a Winter Games.

“That is so exciting because I am a huge fan of Winter Olympics,” she says.

“I reckon it’s probably the most visual plethora of sporting feasts you can find. You don’t have to be a sports fan to enjoy the Winter Olympics. It’s high octane, it’s exciting, it’s got an element of danger.”

Oliver-Kerby, who is in her mid-40s, learned to ski thanks to one of her first jobs in television.

“I was lucky enough to live in Christchurch and work for Canterbury TV for a few years and we started a ski show,” she says.

“That meant I got paid to get in the van with my snow gear and my skis and head up the mountain and find some ski stories.

“We travelled all around the South Island. We visited club fields. We skied on the real backblocks where there was nothing groomed.

“There was nothing fancy ... No kind of built-in, seat-warmed chairlifts to enjoy. That was seriously the start of a love affair with skiing for me.

“I would have been probably 21 when I hit the snow for the first time. I went once (before that) on a trip with a friend and we basically snowploughed around Whakapapa on Happy Valley,

but there was nothing happy about that valley for me. I was cold, I was wet, didn’t like it.

“It was more about the trip going away with a friend – not so much the skiing.

“The first time proper skiing was as an adult up Mt Hutt and I was hooked from day one. I absolutely loved it. From there, I taught myself to snowboard, booked a trip to Canada for a month and disappeared into Canada and skied all sorts of fields. Snow skiing is definitely up there as one of my passions.” During a visit to Albertville in Canada, Oliver-Kerby was brave enough to hop into a bobsled that was used in the 1992 Winter Olympics.

She describes the experience as, “Terrifying but just a real taste of that high-octane adrenalin rush.”

Oliver-Kerby says the Winter Olympics sports she is most looking forward to seeing on screen include the giant slalom and the biathlon.

“I mean, who goes for a cross-country ski and then pulls their rifle out and shoots at a target while trying to control their breathing? Get in prone position and then shoot at a target. I mean that’s just crazy,” she says.

“But that’s from those Nordic nations that would go out hunting. So there is a lot of history to the Games which is really fascinating.”

Oliver-Kerby, who is married with two daughters aged eight and 10, says her children don’t ski yet, although she suspects that will change.

“Living in Auckland, it’s a major to plan for,” she says.

“We have, though, had a couple of birthday parties at Snow Planet (an indoor ski field) which is the next best thing.

“They have also been at me saying, ‘We don’t just want to play in the snow and roll a snowball or toboggan or tube. We want to ski.’

“So that’s the next thing on the list. After the Winter Olympics, I’ll just be harassed daily. I know it’s coming.”

Besides her love of sport and television, Oliver-Kerby is also passionate about radio and spent more than a decade reading the news on ZB’s Mike Hosking Breakfast.

Now she has changed tack – but only slightly.

Yes, she’s still on radio, but now she is a co-host on music radio station Coast where she works alongside Jason Reeves on the breakfast show.

TV Guide spoke to Oliver-Kerby just a few days before she made her on-air debut with the station.

“I’m getting all my Neil Diamond LPs dusted off, but at the same time coming up to speed with all my Winter Olympics jargon,” she says.

Oliver-Kerby took the job with Coast because, she says, she felt it was time for a change.

“I did 13 years of newsreading (on radio),” she says.

“I loved the job but it was time to challenge myself. By moving to music radio, it’s given me an opportunity to contribute to a show and exercise a bit of creative licence. I’m really looking forward to the listener interaction.”

“We basically snowploughed around Whakapapa on Happy Valley, but there was nothing happy about that valley for me. I was cold, I was wet, didn’t like it.”

– Bernadine Oliver-Kerby recalls an early ski trip