Meet I'm A Celebrity's Hollie Arnold - 2020 contestant and Paralympic gold medal winner
The Paralympian has become the first campmate to depart the Welsh castle.
One of the I'm A Celebrity 2020 line-up had to be the first to leave and in the end that dubious honour went to Hollie Arnold MBE, who exited the castle and left her fellow campmates behind on Friday 27th November.
I'm a Celebrity 2020 – the show's 20th outing – began on ITV on 15th November 15th and although this year's batch of celebs won't be heading down under they've still had a lot of challenging tasks to face, with Hollie taking on a particularly gruelling trial which saw her and Shane Richie crawling through a tunnel filled with critters.
Here's everything you need to know about Hollie, including her biggest phobias and who predicted she would miss most during her I'm a Celeb stint.
Who is Hollie Arnold?
Age: 26
Instagram: @holliearnold8
Twitter: @HollieA2012
Job: Paralympic athlete
An F46 javelin thrower, Hollie has an incredible Paralympic track record.
In 2008 she became the youngest ever field athlete to ever compete in the games in Beijing, while she won a gold medal eight years later in Rio – breaking the world record in the process.
And it's not just the Paralympics where Hollie has won medals – in 2018 she made history by becoming the first Javelin thrower to hold all four major titles at the same time. (Paralympics 2016, London World Championships 2017, Berlin European Championships 2018 and Gold Coast Commonwealth Games 2018)
She has won four consecutive World Championships, and was awarded an MBE in 2017 for Services To Field Athletics.
Phobias? "Spiders."
Biggest misconception you want to dispel in the castle? "I don't want it to focus on my disability."
Role in the camp? "Cook/shoulder to cry on."
Who will she miss most? "My boyfriend, food and my cats."
Dream campmate? "Michelle Keegan – she is beautiful."
Relationship status? Dating.
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What has Hollie said about joining I'm A Celebrity?
Hollie says that she doesn't want her time in the camp to mainly focus on her disability, saying, "Yes I have a missing arm and I am in the Paralympics but I want to show people nothing stops me and it shouldn’t stop anyone else either."
She adds that she is very excited to be taking part and that although the prospect was scary, "it couldn’t have come at a better time."
She says that there may be a feeling that she is an underdog, but she hopes to show what she has achieved by sharing stories with the campmates.
And although she can't train for the series in the same way she does for her career, she hopes that her background as an athlete might give her a slight advantage.
"People might see me as someone who wins medals in sport and I just hope I can use my independence and the pressures I go through with athletics in the camp and the trials," she says.
But being an athlete also comes with its setbacks for the show – namely that she won't be able to rely on her usual diet.
"As an athlete, you have to intake a lot more calories as you have to fuel yourself for training and so it is going to be really hard to limit calories," she explains. "I am not going to lie, I am probably going to be hangry Hollie but I will do my best to get myself and my teammates fed.”
Series 20 of I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! starts on ITV on 15th November at 9pm. If you're looking for something to watch tonight, check out our TV Guide.
