Snowdon wheelchair record

Piece for the South Wales Echo:

PROVING disability is no barrier to sporting achievement, a disabled Welshman is racing up Wales’ highest mountain next month - in his wheelchair.

Rhys Llewellyn of Claude Road, Roath, broke his neck in a freak mountain biking accident in 2000 aged just 21 but is set to defend a remarkable title he claimed last year.

In only their second attempt, Rhys and eight teammates won the Snowdon Push, an annual wheelchair race up the highest peak in England and Wales raising money for the Back Up Trust.

The charity provides opportunities for spinally injured and able-bodied individuals to experience the buzz of outdoor activities together and increase self belief, independence and motivation.

Rhys, a bike mechanic with Halfords before his accident, now works for the charity helping people with spinal injuries adjust to life in a wheelchair.

He said: “It’s about proving to people what is possible. I used to do a bit of climbing and after the accident I didn’t think I would be in the mountains ever again.

“But then last year I climbed Snowdon! You think, if I can get up Snowdon in a wheelchair then it’s no trouble getting around Tescos.

“It helps you pick yourself up when the weather’s terrible and you’re struggling in your chair.”

This year he is aiming to set a new record and break the three-hour barrier for the route from Llanberis to the summit and back down again.

“I’m confident, but it’s going to be hard,” said the 29 -year-old who celebrates his 30th birthday today. "The only place we can save time is on the way up. It was hell for leather coming down last year. I was hanging on for dear life. My brother, who is in the army, reckons it was harder than anything he did in his basic training.”

Walkers are advised to leave seven hours to safely scale the highest mountain in England and Wales (four hours up and three down) and most able -bodied runners would be hard pushed to do it in under three hours, but Rhys and his team have been hitting the local hills to ready themselves for the challenge.

“We’ve been training every Saturday in the valleys and will do some sessions on Pen-y-Fan before the event. The boys are up for it,” he said.

Starting at intervals of five minutes, 15 teams, each including one wheelchair user, will be scaling the 3,650ft mountain on May 24.

Rhys will be supported by eight friends pushing, pulling and encouraging him in his specially adapted “chariot”: his brother Gethin Llewellyn, James & Joe Jones, Gibbo, Paul Nicholas, Matt Bowring, Tom Edwards and Kevin Duncan.

The team hope to raise £2,500 for the Back Up Trust.To support Rhys please go to www.justgiving.com/3hours

Tall Ships Armada heading for Cardiff

Piece for the South Wales Echo:

CARDIFF Bay could be in for an invasion on the same scale as the Spanish Armada if the city wins the right to host the 2012 Tall Ships Race.

The event would see around 100 impressive ships sail into the Bay attracting as many as 1.5 million visitors and a potential windfall of up to £35m for the capital.

Cardiff is bidding to become one of three or four ports hosting the ships as they race up and down the Iberian peninsular and in the Western Approaches off Wales in 2012.

More than 100 ships are expected to compete, ranging from 10 metres in length up to the 40-metres-long classic square-riggers whose masts rise a giddying 58 metres into the sky.

“It’s quite a spectacle,” said a spokesman from the competition’s organisers, Sail Training International.

“Visitors will be able to go on board and have a good look around the ships and get a feel for what life would have been like on them. The port will be transformed.”

The boats, from 15 to 20 countries, crewed by some 5,000 young people from more than 30 countries worldwide, often with little or no sailing experience, take part in four days of activities in each port with racing or cruising-in-company between host harbours.

If Cardiff is successful it could be the start, finish or mid-point of the 2012 race.

The £2.5m cost of mooring the ships would be funded by a £1.4m contribution from the Welsh Assembly Government, £400,000 from sponsorship of the event and £700,000 from Cardiff County Council and the Harbour Authority.

Around 1.5 million people visited Newcastle in 2005 when it hosted the race and it is estimated the event brings an economic boost 14 times the cost of hosting it as people travel from all over the UK to see the ships.

Milford Haven was the last Welsh port to be involved in the race back in 1991.This year’s race will call in at Liverpool from July 18 to 21.

The host ports for 2012 will be announced in May.

Picture courtesy of Sail Training Interantional and Dirk Horticolon.

John Cleese's Barack Obama moment

The highlight of my time on the sports desk of the Western Daily Press was trying to get hold of Monty Python and Fawlty Towers' comedian John Cleese.

The man responsible for the Ministry of Silly Walks is also a lifelong Bristol City fan. But when, against the expectations of his UK agent, he picked up the phone in his Californian home and called the sports desk to talk about his love for the Robins, he also let slip a little gem that set the world newswires on fire.

Cleese, like much of America, has fallen under the spell of Democratic candidate Barack Obama and, should Obama win the nomination to run for President, the former Monty Python funny man intends to offer his services as a speech writer.

Sadly for me, the legend of British comedy called back two days after I had finished my placement and the call was taken by a colleague. But it has been entertaining seeing the story spread and reliving Monty Python's greatest hits in the comments sections of each newspaper website.

Follow the story's escalation from the Western Daily Press, to the New York Times to the LA Times and a nice link back to the original story. The Independent, the Scotsman and a wealth of websites around the world also enjoyed digging out their finest Python references for the occasion. Hold the Front Page also flagged it up within the journalism fraternity.

And John, if you're following it all, apologies for sparking what must be a number of calls to your PA all in the name of a quick chat about Bristol City's prospects of promotion to the Premiership.

Bristol Evening Post cuttings

Cuttings from 10 days on the sports desk of the Bristol Evening Post and the Western Daily Press:

Richie Lambert (above) on his new role as a lone striker in Bristol Rovers' 2-2 draw with league leaders Swansea City at the Liberty Stadium. Making the back page was Steve Elliott (below). The defender was happy to talk after his return from injury and resisting a scintillating Swansea comeback in the second-half to hold out for a point.



Ian Holloway was to be guest of honour at a charity quiz night organised by Rovers' keeper Steve Phillips (above). The modern pentathlon World Cup series came to Somerset (below) and local athlete Sam Weale had a chance to qualify for the Olympics.




A long night at a fans' forum organised by a local church paid off with a back page lead. Head coach of Bristol Rugby Richard Hill, and club captain Matt Salter, spoke out on the club's proposed temporary switch to Rodney Parade in Newport, "because it's a nasty place to go" (above).

Bristol City's veteran striker Dele Adebola talked about the perils of the playoffs at Bristol City's Thursday press conference. He should know, he experienced them five times with Birmingham City.



A second back page lead: Bristol Rovers' director of football Lennie Lawrence revealed Rovers are set to spend £700,000 on the pitch they share with Bristol Rugby Club to ensure a surface that isn't shocking (above).

Bristol Rugby's Richard Hill backed Brian Ashton and aired his views on the appointment of Martin Johnson (below). Both stories were gleaned from meetings at the fans' forum in Keynsham.


Clinton Barr, a Bristol motocross rider works as a bricklayer during the week and represents Great Britain at the weekends (below).


Double olympic judo medallist Kate Howey, MBE, was in Bristol to present an award to a local club (above).

Blackadder's Baldrick is a Bristol City fan. Seeking comments from as many famous Bristol City fans as I could find, I found out comedian Tony Robinson held a season ticket at City for 28 years but relinquished it two years ago.

He claims he was therefore inadvertantly responsible for their scintillating form over the past two seasons. Other fans were cricketer Marcus Trescothick, rugby personality Gareth Chilcott and Bristol comedian Mark Watson.



A disabled table tennis player based in Bristol was named in Great Britain's paralympic team heading to Beijing (above).

Bristol Rovers' captain Stuart Campbell and teammate Craig Hinton have started preparing for life after football (below).



A back page lead on the Swindon edition of the Western Daily Press after Town's press conference (above). Manager Maurice Malpas spoke out on his plans for the summer and introduced a new chief scout (below), the man who unearthed former Manchester United and England defender Gary Pallister.




As part of the famous fans piece, I chased comments from the Premier League's chief executive and Bristol City fan Richard Scudamore. He responded in time for Saturday's back page, on both the Western Daily Press (above) and the Bristol Evening Post (below).

Prem League Chief backs Bristol City

Piece for the Bristol Evening Post:

Premier League chief executive and Bristol City fan Richard Scudamore has backed Gary Johnson to do the business and take the club into the top tier of English football.

The man in charge of the world’s richest league has praised the work of the City boss as Johnson closes in on a second promotion in two years.

Scudamore’s plan for a 39th Premier League game failed to fly, but his other passion, the Robins, could soon be a welcome addition to the division.

The Premier League chief has been a City fan for as long as he can remember and believes the club can hold on to automatic qualification.

He said: “Gary Johnson is an excellent manager and he's doing a great job for City. He took over at a difficult time and that early difficult patch (of nine successive defeats) counts for nothing now.

“Champagne corks on or before May 4th is all I am concentrating on.”

City top the table with five games to play and, in Scudamore’s opinion, can capitalise on the mistakes of their competitors.

“No other teams seem to want to grab the automatic places and nobody has put a "Champions run" together,” he said. “The one that does at the business end of the season will secure promotion. It may as well be us.”

Like any other fan, Scudamore, a qualified Bristolian referee, has been pouring over the fixtures predicting City’s chances of pulling off promotion after almost 30 years in the lower leagues.And he has highlighted the games at home to Wolves and away to Stoke as the key contests in City’s run-in.

“They will have a big say in determining how the top of the Coca-Cola Championship looks at the end of the season,” he said.The former local referee and chief executive of the Football League has had a long association with an under-achieving City side.

He said: “I first attended a game at the end of the 1965/6 Season when I was five years old. “My father used to take me. When he couldn't I went on my own and travelled on Don's Coaches of Soundwell. One of the older men on the coach looked after me. How times change.

“Watford at home was the last game I saw, but the game I have most enjoyed was the away game at Coventry very early on in the season. We beat them 3-0 and showed a real maturity in our play.

“Liam Fontaine and Louis Carey both had fantastic performances in the heart of the defence.”

He remembers the last time the Robins played in the top division, long before the Premier League’s inception, but believes it is hard to make comparisons.

“This team have been put together in a relatively short space of time,” he said.“The 70’s team had played together and been built over a longer period therefore seemed more familiar, or maybe as a teenager time passed more slowly then.” Either way, Scudamore and Johnson will be desperately hoping the current City side can make the fast lane of the Premiership.

Baldrick's cunning plan for Bristol

A slow day on the sports desk saw me wondering what famous fans of Bristol City had to say on their side's extraordinary position in the league:

Blackadder’s Baldrick, a Bristol City fan, could be the unlikely mastermind behind the team’s remarkable run of form which could culminate in promotion to the Premiership.

City are five games away from a second successive promotion in as many years and actor Tony Robinson, who played the accident-prone, idiot servant Baldrick (pictured above) in the BBC comedy series Blackadder and now fronts Channel Four’s TimeTeam, thinks he knows why.

“For 28 years I had a season ticket for Bristol City,” said Robinson. “For the last two years I haven’t had one and I think my negative act has been responsible for our promotion to the Championship and form this year, alongside Gary Johnson’s tactics.

“28 years, and the moment I don’t buy one the team improves beyond recognition.”But City fan Robinson won’t be deterred from buying a season ticket in the summer if the club are promoted.

He said: “I will have to buy one if they go up. I’ll pass it on to friends at Christmas if I’ve jinxed the results and they look like going down.”

His involvement aside, he thinks the fans have played a key part in City’s success this season. “The last game I was at was the away match at Charlton. When we went 1-0 down the fans didn’t whinge, they simply got behind the team and we equalised. They were exemplary. The players react to that kind of support. It was a very moving moment.

“I think there are some teams whose fans always tend to whinge a bit, like Fulham, or Spurs. Whether it’s part of the DNA of being a Bristolian or not I don’t know.”

Another key to City’s success in Robinson’s opinion is manager Gary Johnson and the team ethic he has instilled in the Robins. “We tended to be one of those clubs that if we were trailing with 20 minutes to go we would panic, hoof the ball up and get most of the players into the box in the hope of scrambling an equaliser.

“Now, Gary has created a much more creative and positive team. They keep on playing football, right to the final whistle.

“The perfect example of this is the Norwich game where we kept on playing and got the winner in injury time. What a team finish.“You can’t single out a player for us this season. It’s a team thing. If you look at the goals scored, it’s people who have come off the bench.”

Like any other fan Robinson has been doing the maths on City’s run in and is confident the Ashton Gate faithful could be watching the likes of Manchester United next season.

He said: “My son and I have spent the most of the morning looking at the fixtures for the top five teams and I’m convinced there are other teams with tougher run ins. If we keep our heads and play the way Gary wants us to, then we should do it.”

OTHER FAMOUS FANS

Gareth Chilcott

Former Bath and England rugby legend Gareth Chilcott (pictured left) is a regular at Ashton Gate and has high hopes for his “beloved” City.

“I believe they can go up. A lot of people have been slagging them off but they’ve been magnificent.I do worry about our goal difference, we haven’t been winning as many games as we could have.

“When you think about all the points we have dropped we could have been nine clear at the top.“They’ve definitely provided their money’s worth this season. We went up from League One expecting just to stay up.

“If we do go up again, and I believe we will, we have got to be realistic, take the millions and consolidate.“The league speaks for itself, you cannot criticise Gary Johnson at all. He’s done a great job and can take us further.”

Pete Budd

The Wurzels' front-man Pete Budd (pictured left) was watching City years before Chilcott was even born and remembers being on his Dad’s shoulders at Ashton Gate, aged eight, 60 years ago.

“I never thought it would be as it is. I think we are playing the best football we ever have.“I used to go when I was a little lad. It’s a different game now. The players are a lot fitter, the ball is a lot lighter. They look like a real football team now.

“I would love to see them go up but I would hate to see them flounder.They’re not there yet so I don’t want to predict anything.

“They have got great management and I’m sure they will do it. My dad would have been chuffed.“It’s like having a hit record for a second time. If they go into the play offs they will still do it. They’ve got a lot of fight that team.”

Marcus Trescothick

Somerset and former England cricketer Marcus Trescothick (pictured left) missed City’s last stay in the top flight in the late 70s but is an honoury vice-president of the club and crossing his fingers for a return to the top tier.

“It’s crunch-time now and I particularly fear West Brom as they are able to step up a gear when they want to.“Whatever happens it is a fantastic achievement and I just hope they can hold their nerve.

“The last time City were relegated from the top division I was five years old so it would be wonderful to see them compete at the highest level. For me, personally, it will be nice to see them play in the Premiership against the top teams as I was too young last time round to remember it.”

Mark Watson

Bristolian comedian Mark Watson (pictured left) may be currently on tour Down Under but he's still checking up on City’s progress and is hoping his next gig in at the Colston Hall on October 4 will coincide with Premiership football at Ashton Gate.

“Logically we should run out of steam, but logic has played no part in the insane events of this season.

“I still think play-offs looks the most likely outcome, but then I'm an extreme pessimist and I've only just started to admit to myself that we were promoted last season.”

“I thought Johnson was a great appointment from the outset, even when we lost nine games in a row (luckily, I'm on record as having said this), because of his record with Yeovil.

“But what he's achieved over the past two years is truly spectacular. He deserves to be Manager Of The Year regardless of what happens from now on.

“Marvin Elliott has been my player of the season. Probably the least hyped summer signing, he ended up being the most crucial one.

“Stoke is obviously our toughest remaining game, in theory, but we tend to raise our game on the big occasion; it's the winnable games I worry about.

“I can see Wolves being tricky as they're still in the play-off race and they're exactly the sort of nasty outfit who could ruin things.

“I still have nightmares about when Wolves beat us 6-1 at the Gate and our mascot fought with theirs, and it was on Sky News. Great days for the club.

“It's been a truly amazing season, the best I've witnessed in twenty-two years of supporting City. I just hope, if we do miss out, we can build upon this and become a long-term force in the Championship."