Popular Channel 7 sports broadcaster Abbey Holmes has broken into tears during a highly stressful challenge on SAS Australia that involved a machine gun.
Holmes – who admitted to having a crippling fear of heights – had to abseil down a tall tower and then climb through a window to face a a hostage-situation and enemy armed with guns.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Abbey Holmes emotional after SAS challenge goes wrong.
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Holmes – a former AFLW star who was the first woman in Australia to kick 100 goals in an established Australian Rules football season – panicked as the tension escalated during the challenge.
Ahead of the test, she said her main motivation to complete SAS Australia was to prove “so many people wrong” who had told her in the past that she would “never achieve” her goals or that she was “not capable” of success.
“It’s going to be a massive mental game for me … (and) I freeze when it comes to heights,” Holmes said.
Holmes descends down the tower before entering a hostage situation. Credit: Seven
Holmes was breathing heavily before walking backwards off the tower and was visibly anxious.
She was asked to take a look down before the descent, but was quick to say, “I don’t want to.”
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While descending she was told to move faster and ordered to “stop dangling around”.
The main part of the task, however, happens in the hostage room.
“Calm down, breathe, breathe, breathe,” DS Ollie Ollerton tells Holmes before the second stage.
“People are relying on you. It’s the action you take here that counts. Split second decisions with precision.”
Holmes then charged through a door armed with her weapon, and blazed away.
“Stop, stop, stop!!! What the f*** did you just do?” Ollerton asked her.
“Tell me who have you just f****** shot. Everyone in the f***** room. Everyone in the room is f***** dead.
“So are you going to make the f****** phone call to his mum and dad… ..and say, ‘I’m sorry he’s dead, it’s because I’m a f****** idiot, I was having a bad day.
“You f****** Johnny Rambo’ed it, didn’t you? You know why that happened?”
Holmes shot everyone in the room during the challenge. Credit: Seven
An emotional Holmes said: “Because I was rattled.”
Ollerton: “Yeah. Because you came down there, and you came into that room, and you were f****** all over the place.
“Everything that’s going on, when we go into room entries like this, you can’t afford to make mistakes.”
Holmes later admitted that one of her “big downfalls” was that she put a lot of pressure on herself.
She said she always chased perfection but Ollerton informed her the latest challenge was “a fail”.
Later, during the daily reviews bu the Directing Staff, Holmes was discussed.
“After the abseil she got down, she was crying, she was a mess,” Ollerton said.
“The she got into the room, she went in there … and the only person she never killed is herself.”
Holmes was in tears after copping an earful from the DS. Credit: Seven
This amused the Directing Staff with DS Anthony Stazicker saying: “She’s f****** Billy the Kid … She was about to pull a knife out.”
Ollerton: “Yeah, mowed everyone down. I mean, everyone got it.”
Stazicker: “For me, she was in condition red … you know, you just cannot think. All cognitive thought is out the window. you are just f****** …”
DS Jamie Morton said it showed the tasks were working and doing what they were set out to do, which was put people under extreme stress.
SAS Australia runs on Monday-Wednesday at 7.30pm on Channel 7 and 7plus.
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