Iwan Thomas

Iwan Thomas

Iwan is without doubt one of the finest 400m runners that Britain has ever seen. Securing medals at all major championships, Iwan still currently holds the British 400m record.

 

Iwan went to the 1998 European Championships in Budapest winning Gold in the 400m and in the 4x400m. Success at the World Cup in South Africa later in the year was particularly satisfying representing Europe against the other continents of the World. In what must have seemed an endless year, Iwan flew straight to the Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur where he became champion of the Commonwealth and bought a bronze medal home for Wales in the 4x400m relay.

 

Through his hard work and excellent performances, Iwan was awarded an MBE in 1998.

 

Aside from his achievements in athletics, Iwan has been extremely busy with media work over the last few years. He took part in ITV’s prime time show Celebrity Wrestling, which saw him grappling with various other celebrities. His personality shone on screen and he enjoyed various public appearances during & off the back of the show, which included MTV, This Morning, & T4.

 

In 2007 Iwan took part in ITV2’s ‘Deadline’, where he was challenged with producing a weekly magazine for a period of nearly 2 months along with 9 other celebrities, to be published in Closer magazine. Each week a celebrity was fired from the team and Iwan yet again triumphed to take the top prize.

 

With Iwan now becoming an experienced presenter with a portfolio including presenting roles on BBC2‘s ‘The Human Machine’ and as a health & fitness expert for ‘This Morning’, 2009 proved to be a busy year. He presented Channel 4’s Sunday morning sport programme ‘Destination 2012’.  As a result of his success on the series, he landed the role of Presenter in the Channel 4 commission, 'The McCain Track & Field Show'. Iwan was also a finalist on the hugely popular BBC series “Celebrity Masterchef”, which saw him narrowly beaten in the Final.

 

2010 continued to be an exciting time for Iwan presenting the World Indoor Trials highlight show for Channel 4 and appearing on The Wright Stuff and Daily Cooks Challenge as well as commentating from the Asian Games. Iwan has become a true 'have a go presenter' taking on various challenges including the London Marathon a number of Triathlons including Blenheim Palace and London as well as the Eurostar Triathlon. He also trained with Oscar Pistorius in Italy as part of C4’s 'The Paralympics Show'.

 

As an emerging TV talent and a highly successful GB Athlete, Iwan is in demand around the build up to London 2012. He is sponsored by K-Swiss, Gatorade and drives an Alfa Romeo & Harley Davidson. 

 

2011 has seen him team up with UK Athletics and Aviva as part of their Academy Ambassadorial team, which sees him working at the grassroots of the sport. He has recently featured in the television series ‘Freddie Flintoff Versus the World’, where he went head to head with Freddie doing extreme tasks including a demolition derby and kayaking over a huge waterfall. On top of this, he was an infield presenter at the Aviva Birmingham Grand Prix in July and the London Grand Prix in August. He is part of the Channel 4 team going to the World Championships in Daegu and is also doing a series of features which help to motivate young people to get active with a year to go until the Olympics. He also presented alongside Rick Edwards on the very popular TV Show Tool Academy shown on E4.

 

2012 has already started extremely busy for Iwan doing commentary for Channel 4 at the Aviva Indoor Trials and infield presenting at the Aviva Indoor Birmingham Grand Prix. He has also been a regular pundit for Al Jazeera, working out in Doha on the Arab Games and for their London Calling Show. Through his expert knowledge and fun light-hearted approach, he has been asked to move from pundit to presenter for a London Calling Show in March and will be involved in their coverage throughout the Olympic Games. He is also going to be a part of the Channel 4 presenting team for their coverage of the Paralympics. Away from sport, Iwan has been in demand for a number of TV appearances and has recently taken part in the quiz show Pointless alongside fellow Athlete Katharine Merry and co-presented The Lottery Olympic Park Run on 31^st March with Holly Willoughby, which saw over 5,000 runners crossing the finish line in the Olympic stadium.

 

Iwan is a keen charity worker, taking part in a number of challenges for Sport Relief, including Dragon’s Den, The Choir and So You Think you Can Dance, also running the London Marathon in support of Macmillan Cancer Support & SportsAid.