1990: Challenged? Yes. Beaten? No.

After minimal auditions at school, I ended up on Australian Double Dare.

(last updated: 5 January 2026)

In 1990, a rep from Channel 10 came to our school and auditioned the class for Double Dare. Then in either April or May, with Tom Jennings as host, it came my turn to play and around 8 teams from my school went in that season.

A week’s worth of shows were recorded in one day at the ATV-10 Nunawading studios. I played with a girl who had black hair and pony tails, who I never saw again…  but we won! At one point, we were down 90 – 310, but we came back to win 350 – 310 in an amazing comeback. Our team was called The Untouchables and we ended up with 6 (out of 8) prizes in the final obstacle course.

At the start of the show, Tom asked me what my favourite sports were and I said skiing and tennis and then he asked me what my favourite tennis swing was and I said the drive shot. I meant forehand so it might’ve gone over his head, though.

The recording I had of the show on VHS is long-gone, but this is a clip with Tom as host with other kids from my school (both in blue) including Daniel who was a great tennis player – at least back then and I once met his coach, Solly.

Double Dare - Australia - The Double Devils Vs The Zero Heroes

I am glad we won. That’s all I really cared about. We should’ve won all 8 prizes. DAMN IT!

Interestingly, a number of months prior I had backed the winner of the Melbourne Cup, Tawrrific from New Zealand for a win turning about $4 into $82. First time punter. Solitary bet. I just went down the page and liked the name and looked at some immediately prior race results. The horse was still young and not majorly handicapped which both looked promising. I read about him training with (or like) a horse What A Nuisance. I actually read it like he was a nuisance to train and was hence too frisky. I thought that was a good thing for a race horse (or didn’t matter) and didn’t copy anyone’s bet.

Even to this day (3 Jan 2026) that horse’s time remains 3rd best ever for that race (fastest at the time) so it was a bet for the ages. ‘Trific.

13 years later I went to New Zealand and rode a quad bike (Bay of Islands).. starting slowest in the pack, even got lost/abandoned but ended up the fastest. Weird.


✓ 5 days ago ago