Briony Williams – the amateur baker who finished fourth in this year’s Great British Bake Off – has revealed why she didn’t reference her disability during her time on the show.

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Briony said she that didn’t want to mention her left hand, which stops at the wrist, and declined to use extra equipment as she didn’t want people to think she was receiving “special treatment”.

"I specified early on that I didn't want them to make a big deal out of it because I just wanted to see how people would view it," she told BBC's Ouch podcast.

"[It's] a part of me, not all of me. It's not that I'm embarrassed about it or ashamed of it in any way. I want to be there on my own merit and I don't want people to think that I'm getting special treatment.

"It was almost kind of trying to prove that just because you've got a disability, you can do just as well as anyone else."

She continued: "My mum always had the approach with me – if you can't do something, just figure a way out. I've never looked at it like it was any kind of disadvantage, I just had my own way of doing things.”

Briony got all the way to the Bake Off semi-final and picked up the star baker award during the competition’s pastry week.

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Since the show ended, the baker has got a tattoo to remember her Bake Off days. “[It] was just the most incredible, wonderful, glorious experience and I wanted something fun to represent that,” she explained on Instagram.

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Thomas LingDigital editor, BBC Science Focus

Thomas is Digital editor at BBC Science Focus. Writing about everything from cosmology to anthropology, he specialises in the latest psychology, health and neuroscience discoveries. Thomas has a Masters degree (distinction) in Magazine Journalism from the University of Sheffield and has written for Men’s Health, Vice and Radio Times. He has been shortlisted as the New Digital Talent of the Year at the national magazine Professional Publishers Association (PPA) awards. Also working in academia, Thomas has lectured on the topic of journalism to undergraduate and postgraduate students at The University of Sheffield.

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