'It was stressful!'

Judy Murray tells TV Times how a milestone birthday inspired her to enter TV’s scariest kitchen...

- STEVEN PERKINS

CELEBRITY MASTERCHEF

WED-FRI / BBC1 / TIMES VARY / EPS 10-12 of 15 / COOKERY

Judy Murray admits she’s ‘not terribly adventurous’ when it comes to cooking. But the tennis coach and mother of Wimbledon winners Andy and Jamie was still more than game to take part in this year’s Celebrity MasterChef – not least because it was an opportunity to catch up with judge Gregg Wallace, her fellow Strictly Come Dancing 2014 competitor.

Judy’s taking part in the fourth and final heat of the BBC1 contest this week, alongside Olympic-winning rower Sir Matthew Pinsent, Benidorm actor Crissy Rock, TOWIE’s Pete Wicks and YouTube star Riyadh Khalaf.

Here, in an exclusive interview, Judy, 60, tells TV Times why the time was right for her to walk into the infamous kitchen…

Why did you decide to do Celebrity MasterChef this year?

It’s quite interesting – the opportunity to do it came quite soon after my 60th birthday [last September]. Having hit 60, I had made a wish list of some things I wanted to do, and one of them was to learn to cook properly – and I thought, ‘It’s a sign!’ And I do enjoy watching it when I get the chance. Over the past few years, I’ve had opportunities to do various TV shows, and I really only do them if I think they are going to be fun or interesting – and Gregg Wallace did Strictly with me way back, so I thought, ‘Well, it’s a chance to see Gregg again!’

You don’t do things by halves, do you? You decide to learn to cook, and you do it on TV in front of millions of viewers!