Dan Pembroke MBE - S3 Ep5

[Music] it's time for our special guest [Music] okay so welcome to the friday night show we are back for another episode um i'm gonna do the introductions so uh yeah he's sort of come out of nowhere recently and taken the world by storm um he was on the um 2022 new year's honors list and has received an mbe um and yeah i was at tokyo 2020 paralympics and and received his first gold medal in javelin um so my guest is the uh yeah the brilliant dan pembroke how are you i'm well tom yourself yeah good mate good we look um we look like we could be twins short hair beard i think to be a twin of every other bald man um but yeah it's uh it's good to see you mate nice to see that you're you're wrapping the um yeah the the british uh the british colours um but yeah nice to have you how are you right yeah i'm well um just got back from training another good session ready to smash the new season so uh well my my second season of my para career so um yeah hopefully it goes as well as the last one yeah well i hope so too mate i hope so too um it's uh yeah you you sort of we'll we'll get into it actually because you know there's no better place to start than at the beginning um so you know we we sort of spoke just before before we started recording um and i just obviously wanted to make sure that i got everything right before before uh yeah before we kicked on but um yeah i know at the beginning of your career you obviously had a couple of couple of little issues didn't you and then and then you sort of took a break and everything so but you seem to be doing quite well when when you you know at the beginning um when when you first started um trying to trying to break through on the scene um and then yeah obviously you mentioned um that you that you picked up an elbow injury so what was what did that what did that feel like was that sort of frustrating when when that sort of happened well absolutely um i was you know i'd started javelin from when i was 11 years of age and just picked it up you know at school as every athlete probably does um and then just work my way through the eggs for ranks through my team and uh i broke four british records as i was coming out so i was like this is what i'm going to do you know this is my career and um i'm quite a short jab improver so uh i had to you know fight my way through to be at the top and to prove everyone wrong yeah and everything was going really well um 2011 i had grown 75-89 um which was just shy off of the qualifying mark um to go to the olympics for next year so uh 2012 season opened up it's 2012 london olympics you know the the pinnacle probably of our history in athletics you know as being a british athlete yeah and so i was raring to go and i had a brilliant like winter season ready to uh show what i've got and in my second competition of the year on the fourth row i remember it just like it was yesterday i came down and opened my hip up too early and my elbow came out the side and bang i snapped my medial collateral ligament which basically holds your elbow and stops it from you know basically popping out on the medial side yeah so yeah i didn't realize what i've done at the time and um i was like hopefully it'll be all right and um it wasn't all right and i got an mri scan and yeah for me at that point i kind of thought to myself those of you who don't know i'm actually i'm visually impaired athlete and the time i knew i had this condition i knew i was losing my eyesight you know year by year and i didn't know how long i had left of my eyesight and after this big injury being an athlete takes a lot of dedication a lot of time you can't really go off and do other things you know you need to be on the ball and keep on doing it and i thought to myself i really want to go and travel you know am i going to be able to do this if i spend all this time rehabbing my elbow up to possibly not get to where i was before or even better i mean i needed to be better to be on the on the world scene yeah and so i made a big decision the following year and i said look and my dad was my coach at the time and i uh i remember going into the living room and i was like oh god you know really anxious and i said to him i said look i don't know how how much longer i've got left to my eyesight and um i don't think i can do this if if i fail and don't get where i want to be in athletics i've lost you know all that time where i could have been traveling the world and seeing so many things yeah and i just really wanted to do that and so i said to him that's it i'm out i said goodbye to athletics yeah and um yeah i went travelling that must have been one of the hardest moments in your life by the sounds of things so it sounds like pokes me out now and i talk about it yeah and i'm getting choked up talking about like listening to you talk about it so that's um yeah it sounds like it was a very very difficult time very hard moment um and yeah in my life at that point you know i was like you know the olympics you know i'm i'm gonna go to the olympics in my next competition i'm gonna qualify and i'm gonna go and then for that to just go bomb no way you're not doing that anymore yeah it was like oh my god what am i going to do so but but you were able to you were able to do something that you never thought you would have the opportunity to do i guess and go and travel and and experience some some amazing things so um yeah what was what was that like to take some time off and just go and do that you know what like through all the pressures of you know being an athlete regimented all the time you know you're like training twice a day you know you have to watch what you eat all the time i was like freedom and i remember i literally this is how i started it i didn't decide right i'm gonna go away straight away um i basically just um i said i just need a holiday and so i put my i open the map of europe and i close my eyes and just point my finger down on the map and it sounds like in a film right it's very dramatic um and it landed in the mediterranean scene the nearest landmass was sardinia i said right i'm gonna go there and i love my fishing i love my outdoors and stuff like that so i just got a ticket and and i went out there and um you know i had a spear gun with me i had my fishing rod um i had a hammock with me and um you know just their essentials really and went out there and spent like two weeks just kayaking in the mediterranean sea off of this lovely pristine nature reserve i was catching my dinner um and then coming in into the beaches at night and just keeping it in the caves and oh man it was just so good to be like out and being adventurous you know and on my own and gave me lots of time to reflect and actually when i was out there i read a book called the secret by ron de bruyne it's quite a famous book and it was talked about the the law of attraction and started reading this and my life kind of really took a turn then you know i started approaching things with lots of positivity if i wanted to do it i was going to do it yeah and um you know from then on my life spiraled and i kept on going back to sardinia coming back working as a personal trainer going back out there and in the end i said look i'm going to go and just go out there and see what happens and i spent the season out there in sardinia working as a personal trainer and massage therapist and yeah i loved it and when i was there i met my now fiance and she really wanted to travel as well um so yeah we spent then four years traveling the world together yeah went to new zealand australia and just you know shared some beautiful experiences and really made the most of what i set out to do and that was to see the world with my you know good eyesight yeah two things that that i get from that story is firstly hindsight's a wonderful thing um just being able to to you know you you think of that moment and it like at the time was probably the most heartbreaking thing to have to make that decision but in the long run it sort of paid off for you because you've met your now fiance you got to travel the world and you still came back and you still got that gold medal and obviously like like we said at the start got your mbe as well so you've literally got everything that you could have wanted and it just at the time it didn't feel like that was going to happen but in in in the long run you know all those sayings times a healer all that sort of stuff it just sort of um it just sort of cements that doesn't it i guess um yeah i mean you never know what's going to come in the future you know it might have ended in disaster you know going around traveling you know i'm a visually impaired guy you know going around and i'm you know like i said i love my fishing and my passion drives everything you know and i just go and do it but it's positivity that makes me do these things and i think if you always attack things with a kind of positive attitude don't get me wrong i'm negative sometimes but in general if you try and follow that line it leads you to some really really good paces yeah you know you can just be positive one day the next day is going to be relatively positive as well so just keep riding that train you know yeah yeah and that's that's why it's ended for me and well not ended it's still still going and i came back from traveling didn't really know what i was going to do i knew i was going to you know do massage therapy because i come back to study sports massage therapy in hereford um and then somebody said to me um well um paul had done she said you know why don't you try getting into power sport and uh yeah it just snowballed from there it's a bit of a flurry really of how quickly it happened so i've like started my um 2021 season like european championships i got the european record and and won that one i was like wow that's amazing you know and i love being in that atmosphere again and uh made all the hairs stand up back in my neck what hairs i have left anyway um and then yeah and then paralympics yeah astounding it's an amazing year i don't know how i can trump that one i'm a bit worried well i'm sure you'll i'm sure you'll be all right mate and and that's the thing like you know what they you know what all athletes say and obviously hannah said it um on a episode a couple of weeks ago and that was about you know that one's done now on to the next one and i know that you'll have that same mindset of i've done that now that's the first one by the way and i've broken the i've i've you know i've broken that and i've broken through the glass door glass ceiling or whatever i've got that that step that i wanted to get to i've done it so your mindset i imagine we'll probably be let's do it again let's let's let's try and get the next one let's try and keep pushing and are you planning to i mean it's one of those things like you know um i do have gratitude for what i've achieved and i've i've learned from the years that that's important as well because you need to accept what what's happened and you know um ride that wave as well otherwise you're constantly just chasing and not living in the moment so i think that's a really good thing to reflect and um yeah but i mean i'm saying that my my middle is just sitting there like on the top of a bookcase and gathering dust at the moment but you know it's the actual event like hannah was saying you know being there achieving what you've done you know the medal is fantastic but the actual the the the um the racing getting there is is is what makes it yeah and the graphic name the gratitude that you feel as soon as you get that middle it's a token basically yeah and that's it isn't it like you know all those all those months years of hard work and um all of that time of that struggle that difficult um time that you had obviously gone through in those decisions that you made to then get to that point where you where you had that in your hand you surely had a massive weight lifted off your shoulders at that point where you were like finally like you know i've i've done what i wanted to yeah yeah you know what like it hit home it's been and i'm sure with many athletes when the national anthem plays you know and it is sort of every athlete wants to feel that you know it's you know being your first olympic paralympic game you know and then to stand on that podium and just hear your national lamp from being played you go oh man i made it i made it i've done it and they're playing that when you're on that highest tier yeah yeah and they're playing that for me they're playing that national anthem for for me and that's yeah that must be incredible i've obviously never experienced that but you know that would be you know that's surely an incredible moment to you're never going to forget that as well absolutely not um but yeah no i think i think that's really cool and the kind of things that you're saying there as well is you know no matter what no matter what life brings your way just try and be positive and try and take a positive approach to things and you know i know you know it's hard to sometimes remain positive with things and and obviously it's okay to be upset and get down about stuff not saying that but at the same time you've got to sort of try and power through it and go right okay how do i make the best out of a bad situation yeah i mean it's not look not like i'm saying like you know something bad happens go oh well you know yeah yeah that's not the way to deal with it you have to kind of like absorb what's happened and yeah you're gonna feel and you're gonna feel down and uh it's it's good to know when you can kind of stop that wallowing in it you know and just go right i don't really like feeling like this anymore let's let's try and do something that's going to make me feel better and then work on that positive thing and climb up the spiral you know yeah yeah i think that's a brilliant way to go about it yeah and i think um you're definitely right there there has to come a point where you go but i'm going to stop i'm going to stop sitting in this you know wallow of pity here now and i'm going to go right what can i do to to get myself back on track make myself feel better and and push forward it's so difficult sometimes to just get in that rut and and sort of you know sit somewhere for months at a time sometimes years at a time thinking you know it's not it's not a great position to be in but it is you know you're the only person that can change that i guess so that's it i mean i think you know the longer you do it as well the harder it is to get out i i liken it to a spiral with like a negative spiral going down you know you get to the bottom of that real spiral you've been there for like a year this is you know working for mental health and everything like that like yeah you know it's harder to come back up but um especially people with uh well not especially people this is what i know people with um visually impairment that are deteriorating like for myself you know when i go out you know i can't see too much especially in the night time daytime i'm pretty good but you're always adapting and because mine is the degenerative um condition like if i'd stopped going out like six years ago right and just kept myself inside i would never adapt to the situations and to the rate in which my eyesight is deteriorating so then going out like now if i hadn't gone out six years ago and gone out today you know it would be so overwhelming because you haven't adapted with the continuous deterioration of your eyesight yeah so i think people with degenerative conditions in general i think it's a really good thing to every day do something that challenges you a little bit and uh gets you out of that comfort zone yeah okay cool it's um it's nice to nice to hear what you're saying as well um because like i've i've said this to other people that have come on the show i've said it to jbe i've said it to um hannah like everything that you say hopefully someone will will sort of pick up on this and and it might affect or might help someone in a positive way so it's really nice to hear you say things like this about a situation that you've potentially been in um that you have been in and then how that can you know how you sort of are powering through it and how you're working through it because then it hopefully helps other people that might be in that same situation yeah i mean i have you know i haven't got all the answers you know at all but um you know just things that i've noticed through my life and things that i've taken on board and learned from other people as well and so yeah if i could yeah put that somebody else and that's awesome yeah um so so yeah do you want to go for should we go for a break should we go for a song and then we can and we can come back so um yeah i asked you to pick um three songs uh so i think the first one was a song that gets you motivated right so my song of motivation is offspring um and it's hit that cool okay well we will be back after this we'd like to thank our sponsors social we've got great taste do you okay so we we are back in uh that was our first song um yeah dan's dance first tuesday it is a good song is a good song and i can see why it gets you motivated as well so yeah it's a it's a good it was a good start it's a strong start um so so yeah we obviously we spoke about the early we spoke about the early days and we spoke about the struggles there um but yeah obviously i wanted to talk to you now about someone else that we had on the podcast last season he told me that he shared a room with you at tokyo so what was what was it like sharing a room with jbe with jonathan bree edwards for those who that don't know i i just call him broom um um yeah broom is like he's the most organized person you'll ever meet he's so ridiculous and everything like i think the second day that i shared a room with him um i was i was still in bed right and i was i sort of woke up and uh he was there like with a notepad at the table just writing like his day down like what exactly he's gonna do when his rest time is everything he's like yeah you can tell he's been in the uh in the game for for a while yeah he's very very organized he knows exactly what he's doing when he's going to his event and uh it was brilliant to see him execute it and um you know inspired me quite a lot as well you know i saw that and i thought yeah that's that's kind of how you should be you know but i mean what works for everyone i'm not so meticulous in the way that i do things um i kind of like roll with the punches a little bit more yeah yeah okay now that's really that's really cool and um with with regards to um yeah with regards to your yourself do you have any sort of quirks or anything that you do when you're when you're sort of preparing um it's a hard question really because you probably don't even notice it do you ever yeah you don't i mean um i'd say i'm a little bit quiet before a competition i'm just so very insular um and people mistake that for me being nervous it's not it's just you know i've got a mission um ahead yeah and um i'm going through the run-up everything in my head and uh what i'm doing and taking in the situation itself so yeah i'm quite quite into that um so yeah i don't know that's probably the only time that i'm into them but that's that's fine like because you know you're like you say you're you're keeping yourself most of like motivated but you're also keeping yourself um shut off from everything else around you and just yeah you like you say you've got that i guess that total vision of this is this is my goal this is what i need to do and nothing's going to distract me from from that and yeah i can see i could see why people might take that as you know oh yeah he looks nervous but you know just you know doesn't like what anyone else thinks does it you're there to do the job very funny because because of my visual impairment i don't have any side vision right so i don't have any peripheral vision here and so normally i'm sort of laughing and joking right and then when i'm in this situation and i can't see anybody from the side so you know maybe japanese pros are coming up to shake my hand or meet me or you know and uh they'll put their hand out to shake my hand or something like that and i totally ignore them i'm not doing it because i'm rude yeah i'm doing it because you can't see them and uh so so apologies yeah so every athlete out there that i've blanked ever i apologize yeah it's nothing to do with uh rude being rude it's uh yeah it's down to that um but that's that that's quite funny imagine you just imagine people doing that can't you yeah imagine getting it caught on camera though you know what i mean like budging out on the infield and here's damp bro coming out for his second throw oh he's just flanked an athlete there another one yeah you know it's it's difficult as well isn't it because you know um other other other paralympic games there's there's people um from all different backgrounds people that have got um you know visual impairments people that have got um other other disabilities um that might mean that they act in a specific way or they do something in a specific way and i think people need to be aware that it's not because anyone's being rude um most of the time it's because of specific reasons like you've just you've just mentioned so need to be people just need to be a bit more um relaxed about about that sort of stuff i guess with them yeah i think that's based on our own insecurities you know if we you know somebody doesn't you know um greet us in the way that they want they think oh god you know they're rude or something but it's actually it's not you know you just gotta read the picture a little bit better yeah yeah yeah it's uh there's a bigger picture isn't there instead of just you know like you said yeah but um but yeah that's that's really cool um did you have any i mean he's not he's he doesn't seem like he's a prankster did he he didn't pull any pranks or anything like that on you when you were in when you were staying out yeah yeah no he was good he was really supportive as well obviously it was my first paralympics so and he had been to one before and done very well not as well as this last one in um in tokyo where he got gold um and yeah i think we were just really supportive of each other and he's really down to earth guy and uh it's brilliant to have people like that on the team and also you know many other people with experience hannah croft and um you know discus dan um you know he's uh it's brilliant to draw all um all experiences from these guys and um i think that's what you should do when you go to a big first competition yeah you know take as much experience as you can and then the next one you're better prepared i feel like i feel like i've had the avengers on the show mate i feel like i've got one of the one of each of the avengers like from from the team which is your next one i don't know yeah i've had yeah i've obviously had hannah i've had i've had uh i've had broom and now i've had yourself so you know i've had all of the athletics team pretty much like the the top you know the top ones in athletics so yeah i don't know you yeah he's actually he he runs his podcast as well he's got his own podcast he won't come on mine then so that would be good mate it would be it would be good to have a have a chat with with more you know more like-minded people like yourself i think it's um it's really interesting one of the reasons i love to speak to um to athletes um and and power athletes like yourself is because there's there is always um obviously some something that you've got to come through to get to where you are and i think that's so impressive to um to do that and and i think it's yeah it it if anything it just shows that anyone can can achieve anything if they put their mind to it and i think that's um that's a really important message for for people and young people as well um so yeah i mean i think um paralympics highlights that kind of figure more but i think you know even in um sorry my phone's going off that's bad um sorry about that that's fine this one um but yeah um every um every olympic athlete as well go through you know real big struggles you know i mean their bereavements and their families and they still train yeah you know i think um you know olympic and parent power athletes are on that same level when we you know when we train for an event you know and uh i think the same message is brought through on on both olympic and paralympic a very strong method as well you know to be resilient through hard times yeah i can't i can't remember the name for life me and it's gonna it's gonna look really bad but i remember watching the olympics and there was um a female rower who had been really successful um but she'd gone away to have other children um and then obviously taken some time off to do that but she felt that maybe she was too old to come back and compete again um but she had worked so hard to get back to that point um and then she and then i think it was something along the lines of like she picked up an injury a couple at like like six months beforehand and she didn't think that she'd put all this time and she was going to make it and then she picked up an injury and it was like sort of give or take whether she was going to be able to compete um and uh and she she did it she got there they they didn't get a medal but the the fact that she had gone through all of that to get to that point i think is is amazing as well um you know that it's um it really is awesome the fact that people you know and not everyone can do that but the fact that there are people out there that are so difficult to do you know i mean you know especially i mean these athletes have been training all their lives you know this one point you know it's not just necessarily a four-year cycle for the olympics you know it's it's from you know young teens all the way through and um yeah when things can try and you know try and come away from you um you know at that point you know it's very hard to get over and to be resilient through those times when you're being really really tested yeah it takes a lot it takes a lot to stay where you are yeah so um yeah it was helen glover i've just i've just had a quick look yeah helen glover um she she was training on two hours sleep she was yeah she obviously she had her babies and she was still training and looking after her babies what a warrior a warrior and that's just incredible like stories like that and then they're still able to go to the olympics and compete like that and it's just incredible like the stories that you hear but yeah um incredible but yeah so so i just yeah i found it really interesting when when broome said that he shared shared a room with you and um yeah that to be um i spoke to reece dunn as well and and he was talking about obviously it was it was his first um his first paralympics and um he was talking about what the feeling when he first walked into into the games um what was that like what was that like for you to to finally be there and just have that atmosphere and um yeah to be in the village with all the other athletes as well yeah i think um when i got there obviously i knew that there wasn't going to be any spectators in the in the stadium and uh and so i made a decision um before i competed not to visit the stadium just because you know i wanted that wow factor to hit me when i started to compete yeah so i didn't even look at like pictures of the stadium or anything like that right and um i was competing at night time pissing down the rain right like proper english rain you know i mean like torrential downpours and there was probably half an inch of water laying on the track when i and so you know there's all these things happening around you know it's really wet you know like it's cooler than we thought it was going to be i've done all this sort of um acclimatisation for weather you know sitting in like hot rooms and stuff like this and then we got there and on the day of my competition it's like cold and wet anyway but like i was sitting there and um we were a bit late to go out and um i was sitting there keeping myself warm and everything and then like we brought round the back of the stadium and there's like these like tunnel like uh like a roman what do you call the um amphitheater is it yeah yeah there's like these big arches there and um i sort of look through and there's all this light coming through you know and it's like daylight you know so many lights in that stadium you just look into it and you're like oh my god what were we about to do and then we led out there and you just you feel so small there's like seats going up to the night sky yeah and all these lights shining down at you and you can see all the rain coming down it was just like an immense feeling my heart went from like resting heart rate of you know 60s up to about 120 just like that you know yeah and yeah it it gave me the feeling that i really wanted and the reason why i didn't look at the stadium before i went out and um i was there didn't matter if there was not one person in the stadium i was pumped and um yeah that that third bro man just came down and boom it's uh it's it's crazy isn't it like i i look at it and i think there's not many people that feel how the gladiators used to feel in in rome yeah and there is like there is only a few people that get that feeling and i think that the closest that you get to that is at the olympics um or or yeah i like the games is that you get every four years i think is the only time that anyone ever could feel like how they used to feel all of those years ago um you know when they were yeah um i'm just glad that we're not in them times anymore yeah yeah yeah i think i think you'd be all right i think you could hit a couple of a couple of people you know yeah um i i think it's enough to still feel like a gladiator i wouldn't want to be one yeah yeah yeah um but yeah i think and i think the same with um you know i watch mixed martial arts as well so i watch ufc or watch mma and and that's another one where i feel like you know they're they're the they're the only other people that i think i could look at and go that's the closest to gladiators because they have all these thousands of people watching them and they go into this little cage and they just like fight each other and i'm like that's just it's mental it's absolutely mental [Music] at the moment um i just i like him i think he's uh he's he's just a bit of a nutter but he's uh yeah he dyes his hair he's covered in tattoos so i've got loads of tattoos as well so i just i don't know i think he's pretty cool so um do you do you watch ufc i i i used to um i think colin mcgregor really kind of caught my attention you know when he was like trash talking and all that kind of lost yeah i don't really watch it as much now yeah but yeah when yeah when i was watching colin mcgregor coming up pretty ranked it was yeah really exciting yeah he's he's an incredible he's an incredible fighter um and uh at this point in that fight between aldo yeah like 10 seconds 11 seconds yeah and he he broke his leg as well didn't he he's um in that fight which was horrific to watch like i remember watching that with one of with one of my mates and um you know we stayed up to watch it and we were very very drunk and when that happened we were both like oh like just didn't know how to react like because obviously they don't shy away from it they show that sort of stuff and slow-mo as well yeah horrible horrible um so yeah we'll talk about other sports so do you i mean is there any sports that you that you watch that you really enjoy i mean into football or anything like that or you know what i don't i don't i don't watch any other sport really um no um i was never good at any other sport except javelin wasn't good at football couldn't see the ball coming in couldn't see my teammates on the side same with rugby so i would just literally pe classes at the door just grab the ball they'll give it to me and i'll just run and shout nobody would go near me but i don't think that would work on a rugby at my age but now i'm i'm more of a doer if i if i like looking sport i'd do it rather than watching it i don't really like sit down watching it yeah obviously watching the olympics from uh winter olympics been great yeah you know i don't watch england play uh football you know it's uh pretty good so uh but yeah that's about as far as my sporting goes i hope they just don't get me on questions and sport they'll be awful dan with zero points uh you can't be good at everything mate you can't be good at everything so um but yeah i mean it's uh yeah it's it's really interesting actually to hear you say that because you know again that's not the first time i've heard that from from someone that um you know is a sporting star um is an athlete to say actually i just do it i don't i don't sit and watch sports i'm too busy too busy doing it or you know i'd rather just play it so um i think i think it's really interesting to say here um so so yeah i mean do you want to go into trying to go into another song should we go should we go for a break yeah right for my next one um you asked me for a song that i listened to before a competition now this this tune is um by breaking benjamin and diary of jane and this one was like when i was um growing up and i aspired to uh my best jam forever of all time yanza lesney um somebody had made a compilation video of him throwing and this bro um this uh song was played over the top of that and um yeah every time that i listened to the sorrow i just see leslie just slamming down that left leg and just you know unleashing massive pros yeah so yeah i always listen to this song before i cool we will be back in a second i once flew all the way to hogwarts to interview darth vader i love star trek okay so we are back in um i did have a question i was going to ask you and we usually ask everyone that comes on this question so i feel like it's it's important that i ask you the question um so if you could have a dinner party and you could invite four people of your choosing um anyone alive or dead um who would you invite okay well they're all alive yeah so i would have because i'm a big fan of these guys uh ricky race i know steve merchant yeah and carl pilkington the trio yeah i just absolutely love them three when they're in a room it's just like it's comedy gold yeah so i would yeah i would i would have them three and then i would have somebody who's very intelligent and um you know could get some really good conversations going and that would be david attenborough and i think the dynamic of like david attenborough talking to carl wilkins oh it would just be amazing i could see that i used to love their show the the three of them when they did when they did their show together yeah the old podcast yeah ricky ray show wasn't it yeah i used to i used to love that i used to think it was absolutely brilliant um listen to them on a repeat yeah yeah they are just they are so funny and stephen merchant is just a legend as well um yeah yeah ricky gervais i mean afterlife have you watched that have you have you if you have the i mean just got over crying about it like third third season oh man it hit her hit my heart but yeah there's so many funny things in it it's like an emotional roller coaster isn't it yeah yeah yeah and some of them are one of the best theories i've seen yeah it's up there with breaking bad i'd say yeah it's um it is very very good i think it's from what happened at the end i'm not gonna ruin it for anyone that hasn't seen it yet but i kind of feel like maybe that's the last one the last season yeah i think he's doing exactly how he done on the office you know when when ricky gervais um you know made the office and uh you know kind of leaves you wanting more but yeah i don't think he's gonna do it because obviously that was that's what made great deal is if he made another one and it was kind of okay then you know it would lower the whole of the uh the rest of the series so yeah i think he's done the right thing he's left with a fantastic message and uh yeah i love it oh and derek as well if anybody's not watched derek yeah and ricky bass um plays that he directs it as well and he's i thought he's just so good he's such a talented bloke isn't he so yeah he's so good and his standard was incredible as well i love watching his standard he's uh he's really good with his with his standard comedy so um yeah you've seen me like on instagram and stuff where he puts his pictures of him in the bar with a double chin like just like horrendous just to take the mick out of our society and how we all look so fantastic in social media and things like this he just like wants to make himself look as unattractive as possible [Laughter] he's uh yeah he he's an absolute legend he's so he's so funny um uh so yeah i mean we we are on to our final section down and you know what that means it's uh it's quick fire time it's quick fire around um so you know uh because because you've uh yeah you've tuned in and you've heard it um hannah is currently on 15. um you know jbe is on 14. so the the stakes are high mate the stakes are high um you've got to get 16. i'm not very competitive um so i'll get the timer set up right and i will i'll take jbe's advice and i will try and be quicker with my uh with my asking of the questions okay yeah let's do it okay three two one i'm nervous now you've got me nervous i feel like it's all on me um this isn't how this isn't how the game should be played all right okay ready three yeah two one go favorite sport javelin facebook twitter or instagram twitter favorite singer it's your favorite film into the world favorite song um get that sweets or chocolate sweets favorite soup hero thought favorite holiday destination sardinia tea or coffee dude favorite color blue doggle cat oh oh my god night in or night out not in what was your first job receptionist do you have a hidden talent i can roll my stomach mode of transport like eight biggest crush growing up biggest crush growing up jessica alva take away of your choosing indian oh my god that's it that's it this is gonna be good it's gotta be anyway i think i think you look good mate here so all right let me see maybe i'm taking this really too seriously are you ready so you have scored drumroll please 17. [Music] it's top of the leaderboard ladies and gentlemen is top of the leaderboard absolutely smashed it and i felt that was good as soon as we got past about i think we were about eight and i looked at the clock and there was still like 28 seconds left and i was like oh my god i was like you you're gonna smash this and then yeah it just uh it just kept going kept going jb is not gonna be happy about that because he's gonna he's his his response will be you read them quicker for him he'll be saying to me you read them quicker for him than you did for me so he'll demand about it so he didn't you see so you know i mean yeah uh brilliant dan well um i will get that onto the top of the leaderboard mate and i will be sure to send that directly to jbe and and the rest of the team as well i'll share it with the rest of them um yeah um but yeah mate it's been brilliant to have you on thank you thank you so much for for coming on the show um i've enjoyed it it's been great time thanks and uh and yeah hopefully we can have you we can have you back on soon um yeah no that'd be awesome just on a final note what's coming up for you now mate what what have you got planned so i will be joining um hannah coccraft over in dubai and we've got the world para athletics grand prix um the first of the year so i'll be doing my season opener out there um i've been pretty good but to be honest yeah so it'd be nice to launch a big throw out and then obviously unfortunately as i think um hannah and jb have already said that our world athletics championships have been cancelled which is bit for obama this year yeah um so yeah i'm going into the able-bodied um british champs so i'm going to try and do my best there and let's hope that a power athlete can bring home a uh a medal at um at the british champ hopefully it'll be i think it will be the first time yeah mate that would be that will be incredible and what a story that is as well that's um yeah let me think yeah well i didn't i didn't even like i wish we'd have had more time because yeah i'd have really liked to delve into that but we i think you know with most of the people that come on the show i never even get a chance to scratch the surface like there's so much more that we can we can talk about that we don't get around to so absolutely we'd love to have you back on mate and we can we can talk about it then um and then hopefully you'll have the outcome of that as well you'll know you'll know what's what's happened by that point so it'll be an even even bigger story talking to my future self well done um so yeah we're going to end on your final song so so what did you what did you pick for your final song he asked me for a party song um i'm not really much of a party goer um but i would say a song that gets me kind of hyped and really good and good is that sam fender and hypersonic missiles it's the tune and when that sax comes in it's just like bang on what absolute tune that is to end the show so dan thank you so much for that mate and uh and yeah hopefully we will speak to you again very very soon fantastic cheers tom i once interviewed madonna i was a virgin and she touched me for the very first time oh my god that was a great interview