EXCLUSIVE! Paul Ryder opens up about ‘terrifying’ experience on Ultimate Hell Week

Paul Ryder has opened up about “terrifying” experience on RTÉ’s Ultimate Hell Week: The Professionals.

The show will follow a host of famous faces as they take part in a gruelling special forces selection course designed by former members of Ireland’s elite Special Forces unit, the Army Ranger Wing (ARW).

Virgin Media Television presenter Paul is one of the 20 well-known personalities who will attempt to pass the Hell Week course this season, which kicks off tonight.

In an exclusive interview with Goss.ie at the RTÉ New Season Launch, the professional dancer admitted: “I don’t know what possessed me to do the show.”

“I don’t know why I disappeared to go film the most crazy experience of my life. But at the end of the day, it’s a challenge and that’s exactly what I wanted for myself. Especially after the last few years, we’ve lived in our own little bubbles and something just said to me: ‘Alright Ryder, it’s time to challenge myself.'”

“And that’s exactly what I did by being a contestant on Ultimate Hell Week. It was terrifying, but rewarding in the end.”

 

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When asked what his biggest challenge on the show was, Paul replied: “Four grown men screaming at you on the daily, yeah that was probably the toughest part because that’s not part of normal life.”

“To have four massive men who are the most scary people in the world, like they are every horror film’s nightmare, to have them scream and shout at you on the daily… that probably was the scariest bit.”

This season’s line-up also includes social media star Tadhg Fleming, former Miss Ireland Pamela Uba, actor Johnny Ward, TV presenter Blathnaid Treacy, Olympian David Gillick, and Mrs. Brown’s Boys star Fiona O’Carroll.

Over six days, the celebrity recruits will be required to pass numerous rigorous physical and mental tests.

Surviving on two to three hours of sleep a night they will have to overcome cold-water events, height tests and claustrophobic challenges as well as various trials of strength, stamina and determination.

Based on the actual exercises and tests currently used on Special Forces selection, the DS have designed a course that will test each recruit’s physical, emotional and psychological resilience.

The recruits, some of Ireland’s fittest celebrities, all have one thing in common, each of them believes they have what it takes to pass the course.

Hell Week is the mother of all challenges; it is not like any other reality TV series, it is raw, real and relentless; with no certainty that anyone will make it to the end.

Will any of the celebrity recruits have what it takes to pass selection? Or will they have to D.O. (drop out) by handing in their number to the DS?