Strictly's Ellie Leach spills on her Glitterball trophy accident
The trophy took a bit of a battering during a train journey from London to Manchester.
Strictly winner Ellie Leach has revealed her father had to fix her glitterball trophy in his shed after it broke in her luggage.
The former Coronation Street star, 22, became the show’s youngest winner when she beat Layton Williams and Nikita Kuzmin and Bobby Brazier and Dianne Buswell in the final in December with her professional partner Vito Coppola.
But the trophy took a bit of a battering during a train journey from London to Manchester.
Ellie told BBC Breakfast: “I didn’t want to carry it and be like ‘Oh here I go’, so it was in my bag and it broke. My dad fixed it and now it’s perfect, in the middle of the table for everyone to see.”
Ellie, who is currently on the Strictly live tour with Vito, said her time on the dancing competition was a transformational experience.
She explained: “Strictly has changed my life so much.
“I didn’t realise how much I would have learned about myself and how much I would have grown in confidence and I just feel like it completely changed me for the better.
“It’s something that’s completely out of my comfort zone.
“I’ve never danced before, so it’s the unknown.
“Usually, I’m so scared of the unknown, whereas I feel like I just really tried to embrace the whole experience, and for me, that’s what worked.”