Gladiators - Are you ready?
"Contenders - in this challenge you will try to prevent yourselves being buried alive by the mighty team of NCV gladiators.
You will go on my first whistle.
Gladiators - you must try to plant no fewer than 1500 of the arboreal contenders within the alloted time.
You will go on my second whistle.
Are you ready?"
Peep!1500 trees, squeezed into this cage, steeled themselves to resist the onslaught in this 3 round competition.
Peep!12 Gladiatorial NCVs raced into action, across the field of Maxfield Plain, Pateley Bridge, wielding spades.
Hang on - something doesn't look right.
Shouldn't the Glads be dressed more like this?
Well, yes. Obviously. But the BBC insisted that they wear weather appropriate gear for this episode. Health and safety gone mad!! Mind you - the weather was appalling to start with - as the video footage below shows (heavy rain and 200mph winds). Luckily this improved 100% after an hour of filming.
Back to the action....
The arena had been double fenced to keep the sheep from
nibbling the tops of the saplings.
Challenge number one was entering the ring.
Gladiator Athena demonstrated
excellent vaulting capability here.
Wham!
Gladiator Phantom inserts the
first contender - Dolly Dog Rose.
Bam!!
Gladiator Viper inserts Harry Hawthorn
who tried to fight back to no avail.
Wallop!!!
Gladiator Apollo ignores
Henrietta Hazel's doe eyed
pleas for mercy and sticks her roots
firmly into the soil.
Denis Dog Wood played dirty
and wore a luxuriant root wig
to try to create havoc.
All to no avail.
Biff!!!!
Gladiator Legend simply laughed
in Denis's face and stuck him into the ground.
Luckily, there was a 2m gap
between
the arena fences to allow the muscly glads
plenty of space for action.
This allowed 450 candidates to be seen off
by the time refreshments were due.
Off the glads went for a short
rest in the green room
The cameras kept rolling, taking in the
quality of the BBC catering department.
Chef Lorraine had done a superb job
and the glads were extremely grateful.
Then it was onwards- to arena number 2.
Gladiators Phantom (Left) and Bionic (Right)
carried the next tranche of 540
terrified contenders off in a trug.
was by wheeling this HUGE box of tubes
across the field.
The watching crowd roared in delight.
Particularly appreciative
of the whole competition were
Louis...
...and Grumpy Ken.
Gladiators Bionic (Left) and Steel (Right)
ran ahead to poke canes into the earth
in preparation.
Bong!
Another one bites the dust!
One after another of the contenders failed
to deflect the NCV Gladiators from their goaland were firmly imprisoned in plastic tubes.
After a final tubing frenzy
the competition was over.
The third and final batch of
510 contenders was dealt with.
Final result - carnage! And 240m of newly planted hedge. The Gladiators wiped the sweat from their brows and downed tools before emerging, triumphant, from the arena. The crowd went wild!!
Gladiators from left to right:
Athena: Nitro: Phantom:
Legend: Giant: Steel: Apollo:
Bionic: Viper: Fury
If any viewers would like autographed portraits of any (or all) of the gladiators they can be purchased at a reasonable price from the BBC.
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