Daniel Allen’s BBC Sports Personality Adventure

Following the Blue Peter story on “Being Me”, the BBC contacted me to ask if I would represent Blue Peter as a judge for Young Sports Personality of the Year.  Of course I said yes!  I went to Manchester with my dad to meet the other judges and to discuss the nominations.  I was sitting with John Inverdale, the chairperson, and the other judges – Olympic triathletes Alistair and Jonathan Brownlee, 2011 Young Sports Personality of the Year winner Amy Spencer, Radio 1 presenter Tina Daheley and Blue Peter presenter, Radzi Chinyanganya.  We sat around a big table together and I felt quite nervous!  The judging took quite a long time while we were going through all the nominations, but I enjoyed being there. 

I was also invited as a guest at the Sports Personality of the Year show which was in Leeds on Sunday 15 December and was being shown live on BBC 1.  First, we went to the pre-show BBC Reception.  Wow, it was amazing!  My dad and I were then taken on the coach to the venue.  Once we got there, People were staring at us as we walked down the red carpet and I heard someone say “who are they?!”.  It was so funny, I felt like a famous celebrity!

We were showed to our seats and I couldn’t believe who we were sitting next to – Sir Alex Ferguson, Sir Bobby Charlton and David Moyes!  Unfortunately, we were then told to move!  We were showed into different seats and ended up sitting next to Rebecca Adlington. In front of us was Alan Hanson!  I looked around and could see so many famous faces – Louis Smith, Jessica Ennis, Alan Shearer, Ellie Simmonds and Sean Clare.  It was like a dream!

When the show finished, we managed to chat to some of the sports stars and I had photos taken with Jessica Ennis, Rebecca Adlington, Alan Shearer and Alan Hanson.

After the show, my dad and I had special tickets to go to the after-show party where we mingled with the celebs!  To be honest, I couldn’t see much because everyone was so much taller and it was packed out!  It got to about midnight and we were really tired and I wanted to go to bed, but my dad was desperate to get one more photo of me with Gary Lineker.  After searching for about 15 minutes, I found him – he was really nice, a bit drunk but very friendly and my dad managed to get that final photo!

What an experience!  One I will never ever forget.  For one day, I was a celebrity – well, sort of!

Daniel Allen