James Cracknell’s ex Beverley Turner would have ‘resented’ him if he she took his surname

Beverley Turner was married to rowing champion and double Olympic gold medallist James Cracknell from 2002–2019 .  

And in a new podcast recorded with Ben Fogle’s wife Marina, called As Good As It Gets, TV presenter Beverley, 47, said that she would have ‘resented’ James if she had taken his name when they married.   

She said: ‘I didn’t [change my name]. It was really important to me. I probably cemented the idea [that I was going to stay Turner] when I was doing English at uni and talking about the stigma of language. 

‘And over the years, if we raided a country, in terms of colonialism, the first thing we do is try to take someone’s language and disempower them by taking it away. 

‘For me, I was always conscious of words and the importance of words and what that means to you. I felt like I was a Turner. I am a Turner and I will always be a Turner. I think it was also a feminist thing.

‘I felt like it was in the Victorian era that you should change your name. In fact, when I got married, 20 years ago, James said, “I wouldn’t change my name for Bev, so why should she change her name for me?”

‘And I thought if you’re seeing it that way, then I am doing the right thing marrying you. 

She continued: ‘It just felt very old-fashioned to change my name. Also, I was working and had a relatively stable identity as Beverley Turner. 

‘I didn’t want to give that up, I would have been so resentful. Now that we are divorced, in retrospect, it was the right thing.’

Beverley and James are parents to Croyde, 15, Kiki, 11, and Trixie, nine. He is now in a relationship with New Yorker Jordan Connell, 34.

Beverley and James split after a nine year struggle following a crippling brain injury, which saw him knocked off his bike by the wing mirror of a petrol tanker in Arizona. 

He was left in a coma and sustained damage to the part of the brain that governs memory, personality, and speech – Beverley nursed him back to health. 

They went their separate ways eight months after Cracknell moved to Cambridge to study a masters in evolution and Beverley felt he was abandoning the family. 

Beverley said there is a downside to having a different name to her children and said: ‘At school, people always say, “Hello, Mrs Cracknell” and I have to say “Call me Bev.’

She said she has given her children the middle name Turner, not double-barrelled, so they can use it if they want to. 

Marina asked her what she thought of Dawn O’Porter and Chris O’Dowd, who are now called the O’Porters. 

But Beverley was not impressed. 

She said: ‘I think it’s kind of ridiculous. It’s a joke, it’s a really good gag but I don’t think I want to name myself after a really good joke.’ 

Childbirth expert, Marina, 39, on the other hand, who married Ben in 2006, when she was aged 28, said she has never regretted taking her husband’s name. 

The couple have a son Ludovic, born in 2009, and daughter Iona, who was born in 2011 and said: ‘It did not cross my mind not to be a Fogle.’ 

But she did say there were some negatives. 

She said: ‘Beyond the hassle of changing my name, which is a bore, the other issue if you have to constantly spell it.

‘Before, I was Marina Hunt, which is a lot easier. Apart from one time when I had a waxing appointment and they thought the name began with a “C!”‘