Oti Mabuse's Strictly partner Ugo Monye 'pushed self beyond brink' for her despite injury
express.co.ukStrictly Come Dancing in an exclusive interview with Express.co.uk.The rugby star, 38, has teamed up with Boots UK for the second series of the health and wellbeing podcast Taboo Talk, where he discusses the topic of chronic pain with host Vogue Williams.In Strictly Come Dancing last year, Ugo and his partner Oti Mabuse made it as far as week five before they landed in the bottom two and had to be sent home.Just a week before, however, the pairing had to sit out of the competition completely when Ugo's long-term back problems began to flare up and he was forced to go to hospital for a procedure.When asked about how he felt to miss a week of the live show, Ugo replied: “That was difficult.
Because after week one, my back was in bits.“But you only ever get to do Strictly once and it was an unbelievable experience and you want to give the best version of yourself and I said that every week.“I just wanted to get better every week.
And I felt I did, but I wasn't able to do everything that I wanted to do.“I mean, in that final week - on average we were training 11 or 12 hours a day - after I had my back injections, I think the most we trained on a day was four or five.“In total we trained what would have been for under 20 hours, when originally you'd be doing 40 to 50 hours.
And that's frustrating.”Ugo went on to explain how pushing himself during Strictly rehearsals had worsened his back problems.“When your body physically just lets you down and you can't do any more; when the mind is so willing to give so much more but you just can't… That's frustrating, and that's where injuries occur.“I pushed myself beyond the brink, hence why I have this back injury, but I guess that's the kind of warfare that you have between your mind.
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