Billy Monger reflects on Celebrity Race Across The World success: 'People saw a different side of me'

Virgin Radio

22 Aug 2024, 10:19

Paralympics presenter Billy Monger has candidly shared his feelings about competing on Celebrity Race Across the World, admitting the experience made him feel “vulnerable.”

The British racing driver is joining the star-studded line-up of hosts during the Paralympics in Paris, which kicks off on Wednesday 28th August. He’ll team up with the likes of Ed Jackson, Ellie Simmonds and Rose Ayling-Ellis to bring the latest news on the games as it happens. 

Billy, who had both legs amputated following a terrifying car crash, not only continued his racing career after treatment, but he went onto commentate on Formula 1 for Channel 4. 

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In 2023, Billy and sister Bonny made the perilous 10,000km journey from Morocco to Norway in the first Celebrity Race Across The World, in the pundit’s first step into reality TV. 

Unfortunately, Billy and Bonny had to pull out of the competition before the final leg following a family emergency back home, but despite cutting their adventure short, the TV star admitted RATW helped to bring him out of his comfort zone. 

Speaking to virginradio.co.uk and other press ahead of the Paralympic games, Billy recalled: “I'd say doing Race Across the World was a very different experience for me. I'm very much used to growing up as a racing driver, I had my accident in racing, and then all my TV work, really, up to that point in time had been just punditry on Formula One, all of those sorts of championships. So all of a sudden to be doing TV, but kind of it's just about you, and it's about this journey that you're on.”

He added: “Obviously, it was with me and my sister, and it wasn't anything to do with the sport that I know inside and out, you do feel a little bit vulnerable. It's all personal questions, and all this experience is unique. It’s not like anything that I'd done before.”

Being known for his sporting work meant that a reality competition gave audiences “a different side” of the star previously unseen by the public. 

Billy continued: “Just my personality, my character, how I worked as a team with my sister, and it definitely was out of my comfort zone, but I actually really firmly enjoyed it and made some great memories from doing.”

Being in the Paralympics presenting line-up is also out of Billy’s comfort zone, but he’s grateful he gets to dip back into sports. 

He continued: “This is going to be my first Paralympics as a double amputee that I would have properly seen, because the last Paralympics…it was in COVID.  I'm really looking forward to actually just being in these stadiums and seeing all this sport happen in front of us, and hopefully be able to communicate to people at home how awesome it is.”

Earlier this week, The Last Leg crew - Adam Hills, Josh Widdicombe and Alex Brooker - joined The Chris Evans Breakfast Show to discuss hosting the hilarious series in Paris as the Paralympic games continue for two weeks. 

Looking forward to the upcoming coverage on Channel 4, Adam enthused: “The great thing about these games as well, Rio [Paralympics] was a weird time zone, so was Tokyo. This is the first games since London 2012 that's pretty much on the same time zone. So you're going to be able to watch all the events all day, watch the finals at night. We're going to have people receiving gold medals at eight o'clock at night in the stadium in the Stade de France, and then coming on our show two hours later.”

Read which Paralympic sport Adam Hills wants to compete in and why he’d be ‘like Raygun' here.

The Last Leg is live in Paris on Channel 4 throughout the Paris Paralympics 2024, starting on Wednesday 28th August. Channel 4’s Paralympic coverage begins 28th August and runs to 8th September