ITV entertainment reporter Ross King has expressed his hope that his stint on Strictly Come Dancing will encourage "men of a certain age" to embrace dance, following his elimination from the BBC show.
The 63-year-old became the second contestant to depart the competition on Sunday, after he and his professional partner Jowita Przystal lost a dance-off against EastEnders actress Balvinder Sopal and Julian Caillon.
Speaking on ITV’s Lorraine, King said: “We said at the beginning, if I could be most improved, and Anton (Du Beke) gave me most improved two weeks in a row, the judges said some really nice things.
“And also the fact that, I hope now that I have inspired people, especially men of a certain age, who go, ‘you know what? I’m just going to sit around, not going to do anything’, (to) just get out there and dance and have fun, because that’s the whole thing, I mean, I had fun every week.”
King’s Movie Week performance saw him dance the paso doble to the theme from Thunderbirds, achieving Saturday’s lowest score of 19 from the judges, despite Du Beke saying he was the “most improved” of the week.
He added: “It was incredible, we’ve talked about it before, that people don’t realise, it’s not hard work, I mean, it’s hard work, but it’s not hard work to what people do in real jobs.
“But it’s eight hours a day, you are training a bit like an athlete, and just trying to get through, or for me, of course, I’m just trying to get through the dance.”
King went on to say that he would continue to watch the show “by the pool” following his elimination, and thanked the Strictly crew and cast for their help on the programme.
He added that he had “the most amazing time” dancing with Przystal and described the quality of the other contestants as “so strong”.
The remaining 13 couples will return to the Strictly dancefloor next week on Saturday at 6.30pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
