Rachel Riley: 'I'd rather swim with great white sharks than do Strictly again'

Metro

3 days ago

For Rachel Riley, after competing on Strictly Come Dancing in 2013, there are few things more daunting than being thrown around the floor by her now-husband, Pasha Kovalev, to the mercy of millions of viewers.
Her courage is being put to the test, however, in ITV's new series Shark! Celebrity Infested Water – an unexpected gear change in reality TV.
As it says on the tin, stars are chucked into the water with sharks of increasing size, eventually leading to the moment where they'll pluck up the bravery to come nose to nose with one of the world's most dangerous apex predators, a Tiger shark, without a cage.
Speaking to Metro ahead of tonight's first episode, I can confirm Rachel remains fully-limbed and unscathed. She insists that confronting the animal notorious for striking more fear into humans than anything else is water off a duck's back after being scrutinised by Craig Revel Horwood on national television.
'If you asked me tomorrow to go swimming with great whites, I'd be there,' she says. 'If you asked me to do Strictly again, no way.
'The thing about Strictly is that the music comes on and we panic, whereas with the sharks you can take your time to get down. Rationally, you shouldn't be more scared of something that can eat you than dancing on telly. But we're not always rational, are we?'
Tapping into the rationality of shark-wary viewers is the crux of Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters. The premise hasn't come out of nowhere, it's marking the 50th anniversary of Jaws – Stephen Spielberg's horror that's caused me to have many sudden panics in a swimming pool, let alone the sea.
The truth is, sharks are relatively harmless. If you're confident enough to get in a car, you should be able to gleefully paddle in the sea when the road is by far more likely to kill you.
Rachel is joined by a star-studded cast that includes Sir Lenny Henry, comedian Ross Noble, and Amandaland's Lucy Punch. They're mentored by leading shark experts, including Paul de Gelder – a former marine whose arm and leg were ripped off by a bull shark in 2009 but now devotes his life to protecting the species that almost killed him.
He welcomes the cast onto the boat, proudly shows off his prosthetic limbs and tells the celebs they'll be starting their journey in the water with bull sharks.
'I was expecting swimming pools with starfish to start with,' admits Rachel. 'Pasha and I've been to the Galapagos before, and we saw a bright orange thing in the water, thinking someone had dropped a life jacket, but it was actually a sea lion bitten in half trying to get out of the water.
'Its flesh was so fluorescent it looked orange, and then this bull shark came and finished it off.'
Being witness to a shark attack first-hand did nothing to deter Rachel from agreeing to take part, though – far from it. Of all the stars, the Countdown presenter is easily the most excited to be there – jealous, even, of her teammates whenever she was on land.
'I just had constant shark envy,' she says. 'Every time someone was in the water and we were waiting to go and there was a sighting of something, I was like, 'I want to be in the water!'
'There was one second where I even said it out loud, 'if Pasha could see me now, he'd be screaming at me to get out. I'm pushing my luck now.''
In the very first free swim of the process, the group paddles with eight-foot lemon sharks. Noble, among the calmest members of the pack, is actually bitten.
As I mention this, Rachel laughs: 'It was funny at the time. We thought it was just a camera bump, and then you look at the footage, and no, it really was a bite.'
'I mean, he survived,' she smiles nonchalantly. And she's right, the shark's teeth barely puncture his wetsuit. Still, though, it's a reminder that one wrong move with a bigger animal and the damage could be far more serious – even deadly.
Preparing to fly out to the Bahamas, Rachel even wrote a will.
'As soon as you have babies, you're supposed to have a will, so this was the proper impetus.
Right at the start of this process, they told us we were building up to dive with Tiger sharks, which have been found with whole suits of armour in their stomach and that there had been a fatality in that area from Tiger sharks in the last year. So even though you've got all the precautions, they're still wild sharks.'
The celebrity's levels of trepidation to be in the water with sharks varies.
On one end of the spectrum, there's Rachel, who has no reservations to dive straight in, and on the other, you have Call The Midwife's Helen George, who hasn't even put her head under water in over 20 years out of sheer fear.
Initially, it appears Helen is not cut out for free-swimming with sharks or even being near the water at all.
Without giving too much away, her unshakable terror is the heart of the series, watching a woman discover she's much more capable than she gives herself credit for. It's a surprisingly moving watch. More Trending
'What's lovely about the show is we were a team and she's the strongest person I know,' says Rachel. 'She's had the biggest achievement out of all of us so we're all really proud of her, to have the strength of character and strength of mind to not only overcome getting your face in the water, but to go out in the open ocean, take your mask off underwater, she did so much.'
Months after filming, Rachel is still clearly giddy with excitement. Only time will tell if she managed to come up and close to a Tiger shark, but the experience has definitely changed her.
'I've got the bug,' she says. I want to see orcas and manta rays next. I've always wanted to see manta rays, it's like seeing aliens when you're going underwater. I just definitely want to do more diving.'
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Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters airs tonight at 9pm on ITV.
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