Love Island star Dr Alex George spoke to Female First at the Southampton Boat Show, as he chatted about his relationship with girlfriend Amelia, his recent appearance on Celebrity MasterChef and so much more:
Your girlfriend, Amelia, is a dancer – do you fancy your chances on Strictly Come Dancing next year?
Amelia's a dancer, so she would be very good at teaching me for Strictly. I'd definitely consider Strictly, yeah of course I would. And I'm A Celebrity, Bear Grylls, those are the kind of things I feel are challenges and things I'd like to tick off, so why not?
Do you still catch up with any of your Love Island pals from last year?
Yeah, so Jack was obviously one of my very close friends on the show and actually, since the show, sadly, we've hardly spent any time together because we've led very different lives. By nature we're different people and have pursued different things. I haven't seen him as much as I'd like, but I saw him a couple of days ago. We filmed for my YouTube channel which is going out on Sunday (September 22nd, 2019) – it's me and him talking about everything that's happened during the show, after the show and what life's been like.
How are things going with you and Amelia?
Good. It's been a year nearly now, well a year since we've met anyway so yeah, it's been quite a year - it's been an experience. She's had to share a lot of the pressures that's come with the show. There's obviously difficulties of having your relationship in the spotlight, everyone's kind of watching it and seeing what's happening. People asking when you're going to move in together and that kind of thing. I think we've handled it quite well. She's had to take on some of the pressures I have to deal with. If things go well or don't get well, it's always public. She's been great.
You and Amelia are both doing your PT exams together, how are they going?
For me, the reason why I did it is I'm focusing on well-being as a whole, particularly for young people. I'm looking at it as a full 360 angle – between mental health, physical health, emotional health, financial health – everything. So adding that fitness element allows me to have more understanding of how it all plays a part because it's not as simple as 'running makes you cardiovascular fit'. There's so many other elements to it.
It's like when talking about going out on boats at the show, it's as much about being out, being free, socialising, mental health, headspace, de-stressing as it is the actual act of going out on a boat. So, there's always a lot more to play and that's why I think I was interested in doing it cause of the links to everything.
How did you enjoy Celebrity MasterChef?
Really good actually, it was really good. Something completely different to my normal day job. It's another situation of pressure, very different to Love Island and all that kind of stuff. You're in a situation where people are watching you trying to complete a task and judging what your outcome is and that's always stressful, but fun! Really fun. I learnt a lot and I'm going to keep cooking. I got to the quarter-finals and having gone out at that point, I think it was actually quite fair. Dom [Parker] and Jenny [Ryan] went through my heat and actually to be fair that's right – they were better chefs, better cooks so yeah it was a really good experience. I learnt a lot from it.
How are you feeling about not going through to the next stage?
I wish I could have. What's frustrating is that I did the main course that was actually... I think having watched back the show, it was preferred to all the others. I think my main was actually stronger, the only person that was probably close was Dom, I think. Mine and his were neck and neck but the dessert really let me down, that's what disappointed it.
The theory of it was, I was going to use a raw brownie and use dates to bind it so it would be healthy and unfortunately, I didn't have enough dates so it actually crumbled. Which is a shame, but I went for it and that's the best thing to do. Don't play it safe.
How have you been enjoying your day at the Southampton International Boat Show?
I've had a great day, thanks so much [to the organisers] for having us. It's a sunny day, it's bustling here – all sorts going on. From the big boats to the little boats, you've got little stalls everywhere. Had a nice spin out on the Ribeye, so yeah, really good. Great start to our day.
What were you most looking forward to before you got here? Did you know much about the show?
Amelia has a background of boats. Her family love boats so they've talked about the show before. I knew there would be an array of different things going on as well as different boats, lots of entertainment going on as well, like, the guy on the Flyboard, that was very cool. I love anything with an engine.
Had you had a lot of experience out on the water prior to being here?
Mainly just through Amelia. Her family live down around Southampton way so we've been out quite a lot on the boats having a blast round. I've learnt how to tie a few knots and things, which I definitely didn't know how to do before. I've learnt what a fender is and starboard and port.
Alex was speaking exclusively to Female First at Southampton International Boat Show, powered by Borrow A Boat, where he spent the day out on the water at Britain's biggest festival of boating. southamptonboatshow.com
Words by Kevin Palmer, who you can follow on Twitter @RealKevinPalmer.
Tagged in Love Island