Johnny Ward won high praises on RTE’s Hell Week this week as he chose to stay in the challenge despite dislocating his shoulder.
It was a case of last person standing in this week’s show as the remaining 11 recruits had to physically fight each other to the end in an effort to remain in the course and impress the DS in charge.
As usual, they were put through another set of rigorous physical and mental tests on the torturous trail.
And it proved make or break for Fair City star Johnny, 35, as the actor suffered a painful injury during a challenge called ‘King of the Ring’ which saw him dislocate his arm.
The task saw the celebrities fighting to remain the last person standing in a makeshift ring made of tyres.
Describing the gruelling challenge, Chief Instructor Ray Goggins said: “The whole idea of King of the Ring is to try and be cute, we are looking for strong people, we are looking for technique, we are looking for sneaky b*****ds.”
But all eyes were on Love/Hate actor Johnny as a pop was heard early into the battle.
The recently engaged Dubliner said: “Whatever happened, his whole body weight seemed to land on my shoulder and the whole thing, it just popped. And that pain, it was just excruciating.”
After a medic attended to the star and popped his shoulder back into place, it was just minutes before Johnny was back in action.
DS Goggins admitted he was shocked with Johnny’s get up and go attitude at the time, and praised his determination to finish out the course, saying: “In fairness was he flapping about the whole thing, he wasn’t. And to be honest, as a thespian I thought he might go for it, but he didn’t.”
“He had the golden ticket to get out honourably if he wanted to, you know no one would have batted an eye, he got hurt, so be it.
“I thought it was very courageous. Other people would have walked away. But he didn’t.”
The stage and screen star, who also impressed on RTE’s Dancing with the Stars in recent years, struggled earlier in the ring, as the DS pushed him to fight harder in his first battle against fitness influencer Rebeccah O’Rourke.
He went on to impress in his second round in his fight against Olympian David Gillick.
Ward, O’Rouke and Gillick are among the eleven remaining recruits, alongside Peter Finn, Billy Holland, Aisling Daly, Setanta O’ hAilpin, Eric Donovan, Eoin Cadogan, Fergus McFadden and Ciara Griffin who made it to this week.
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