Day 1: Team up

Zeron: We're in a cottage, on a farm, in Gloucestershire. Mike's discovered some wood, but we aren't sure if the fireplace is ornamental or real. But it's freezing so we agree to light a fire and give it a go. The room quickly fills with thick black smoke. Mike and I are trying to do a runner, but run straight into the landlady. She calms us down and points out we hadn't opened the flue!

Mike: By late afternoon the rest of the crew turn up, and a little later we migrate to the pub. Here we meet Andy Cubin, an ex-Red Arrows pilot. He is to be our 'guide' through the programme, teaching us what it takes to be a fighter pilot. I also find out that, like me, he has a black belt in Taekwondo.

Zeron: After we arrived back at the cottage Nic, our producer, briefed us on the morning's shoot before leaving for his bed. I'm left chatting 'til the early hours with Mike. Although we stuffed ourselves at the introductory dinner, Mike raided the kitchen and polished off a packet of cereal. Mike then showed his endearing side: he offered me the best bedroom in the cottage. And he took the top floor, which he later discovered to be infested with dead flies, what a great guy. Sucker!

Day 2: Safety course, stunt planes & gyroscopes

Zeron: The filming at the aerodrome was cold and very laborious with lots of waiting around. I soon learnt that the camera crew are the real heroes on a shoot. These guys slave to get the shots that make us look good on screen. Luke, the camera guy, took pity on me and lent me some gloves and his extra warm coat as I was perishing cold while they were setting up. We did lots of introductory shots then it was time for us to go up in the planes. These are two high performance prop planes! It was an incredible ride and it was amazing to start to get a feel for those g-forces.

Andy then took us through some of the basic requirements of becoming a pilot, which included eyesight and colour blindness tests. We both passed the eyesight test but Mike bombed on the colour blindness test.

Mike: The flight was fun - certainly a lot more fun than the gyroscopes and stuff that followed. I thought that the crew should have just asked me to puke on demand, rather than waste time trying to force me to be ill by repeatedly spinning us in the gyroscopes. Even so the day's horrible stuff was worth it for the best flight in my life - to date. In fact, I've always been more interested in piston-engine planes than jet planes.

Zeron: Producer Nic likes to keep us in the dark about all the things he wants us to do, so he can film the surprised look on our faces as events unfold. As we were strapped into the gyroscopes along came Andy with a Gameboy for each of us. We had to compete against each other on the Gameboy while our balance was shot to hell. Imagine being seasick and asked to play Tetris for 15 minutes, as you get sicker and sicker. You don't see this in the final cut, but you do see me about to throw my intestines into a bucket. Which, apparently, was the shot Nic was hoping to get - he's a mean man!

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Content last updated: 25/08/2005