“If you get a good partner, one you get on with, then it changes everything.” Those were some of the wise words from Zoe Ball when I rang her in February of 2021. I had just been asked for the fifth straight year to be a contestant on Strictly Come Dancing and Zoe was one of the people I called to assess the decision ahead.
She was brilliant and talked about her relationship with her professional partner Ian Waite; how they brought the best out of each other and how their friendship is still strong years after she reached the final back in 2005.
I have always enjoyed working alongside people, from great pundits on Football Focus to great co-presenters on TV shows, and with Helen Skelton on our recent Pennine Adventure, and I knew that being able to bounce off someone on Strictly would be the only way I could survive the show beyond a couple of weeks.
It ended up being one of the greatest televisual experiences of my life but, if I’m totally honest, it started out as one of the worst.
Let me introduce you to the tinfoil tunnel. Once the brilliant team at Strictly pick your partner, you have a day when they film all the shots they use for the opening titles and introductions. That involves you dancing together, and on your own, in a beautifully lit, makeshift tunnel which is smothered in more glitter and shiny stuff than you thought existed on the planet. It is everywhere.
The producers had paired me with two-time world champion dancer Nadiya Bychkova, who moved down the tunnel with effortless grace and just the right amount of sass. When it was my turn, I felt my mouth go instantly dry, and I could tell from the face of the camera operator that my “Theresa May carrying a heavy rucksack whilst wearing an orthopaedic boot” act wasn’t going to cut it. Nadiya just smiled, assured me that it would be OK, and that this was stage one of a long process. She always produced the perfect mix of instruction, encouragement and fun to get us over the line.
Whoever you get as a partner, it’s also important to remember that Strictly is not just a dancing competition. Dancing is about 25 per cent of it and your interaction with the judges, your social media presence and your chats with Claudia Winkleman are just as important as the 90 seconds on the dance floor. The show is so huge that it’s easy to feel it is eating you up, and that nothing else in the world is important, which is why your relationship with your partner is so important.
I met up with Janette Manrara and Aljaž Škorjanec recently to see their gorgeous new baby and they both spoke with great affection for their partners over the years. Aljaž danced with Sara Davies in our series and they had a brilliant connection where Aljaž was learning just as much from her as she was from him. Katya Jones was also there saying “hello” to the new addition to the family, and she talked about how she and Ed Balls were such a powerful combination – their “Gangnam Style” number will never be forgotten.
Just as in life, there are some Strictly partnerships which don’t work. Personalities clash, tempers flare, interviews are frosty and it invariably ends in an early exit. We have all seen plenty of those but thankfully Nadiya and I never had a cross word. I was also privileged to have a front row seat for one of the greatest combinations in the history of the show: Rose Ayling Ellis and Giovanni Pernice.
I interviewed them both for a chapter in my book Standing On The Shoulders and they just spent three months bouncing off each other.
Rose was Strictly’s first deaf contestant and went on to win the show with Gio in 2021. On the Monday morning after the final, Gio said he woke up and it hit him: “I’m not going to dance with Rose again. It was horrible. I don’t mind telling you, I am addicted to Rose. She is contagious. I have to talk to her every day”. If you go and see Gio on tour now, he has a sign language interpreter on the stage. Together they changed Saturday night TV and Gio will tell you that he is a better teacher and a better person because of the time he spent with her. She reminded him of why he loves to dance.
All the professionals are brilliant, and I hope this year’s crop of contestants realise what a privilege it is to be learning from someone who is one of the best at what they do. My one warning is that, if you do get on with your partner, you will be introduced to the obsession with the so-called “Strictly curse”. While the media will spend hours discussing that, they ignore the fact that friendship can be a real blessing, and it’s friendship which underpins the best partnerships on that show.
The best partnerships continue long after the glitter ball has been handed out.
This week I have been…
…Golfing
My golfing experience this week did involve a little Strictly flavour. Playing in front of thousands of people at the BMW PGA Championship Pro Am is one of the great privileges of doing my job. Our professional was Eddie Pepperell and the team included Strictly judge Anton Du Beke, Vernon Kay, husband of Strictly host Tess Daly, and we were accompanied for some of it by my dancing partner Nadiya, who was a guest of the organisers. She has got into golf in the last few months and is already annoyingly good at it.
…Gardening
I do love a project and we are currently toying with getting rid of a manky old greenhouse and replacing it with some sort of garden hut. My wife and I went to the Tatton Flower Show this summer and I spent most of the day sitting in various garden buildings. We are currently investigating something called Breeze House, which is an open garden room built from sustainable material, so I may have a weekend of digging a concrete slab on the horizon.
…Spasming
I am still feeling the after effects of that bicycle accident back in February and this week it caught up with me again. I am having some weird nerve pain down my right side, and every now and again it really kicks off. I had an almighty back spasm at one point so if you see me walking around with a hot-water bottle, or randomly lying on the floor rolling around on a massage ball, you know why.