My public speaking skills were truly tested at the Lord’s Taverners Balloon Debate at the start of May.
The ‘sporting heroes’ event, which raised thousands of pounds for a very worthy charity, had Olympian Gail Emms, football legends Mark Lawrenson and Danny Mills, and er…me, battling it out to win the votes of a 250-strong audience to be kept in a metaphorical balloon.
We all had to speak about our sporting hero over a series of three rounds of six minutes, four minutes and two minutes in length, but with one sporting hero voted out of the balloon after each round.
Because I prefer the unusual sporting hero, I plumped for the 1960 Tunisian Modern Pentathlon Olympic team. They have a very interesting story to tell.
Luckily my Tunisian waffle was good enough to see me through the first and second round, with zero votes cast against me. Mills and then Lawrenson crashed out.
That left Gail and me to duke it out in the final. Gail was talking about her superstar 70s footballer mum and it was just enough to see her through to claim the winner’s crown, although it was so close that there was a recount on the votes.
I knew I wasn’t going to win, as soon as the charity auctioneer on the night turned to me just before the final round and said the immortal words -“You’ve got this in the bag, Scott.”
The power of jinx will always win through. Huge congrats to Gail, a very worthy winner.
If you want to read more about the night, visit the organiser’s excellent blog, or if you want me to liven up a stuffy corporate event then go to my contact page and drop me an email.