Having survived polio as a youngster, Ade Adepitan has gone on to compete as a wheelchair basketball player on an international level and has a wealth of TV presenting experience.  Recently, Ade Adepitan acted as a judge on BBC3’s Dancing on Wheels, alongside ‘Strictly Come Dancing’s’ James and Ola Jordan. Six couples consisting of an able bodied celebrity and a wheelchair contestant competed in Latin and ballroom disciplines to win the chance of competing at the Wheelchair European Ballroom Championships.

Using his sporting expertise, Ade Adepitan has appeared a regular studio guest on Five’s NBA coverage. He has interviewed the big stars match-side at the O2 for NBA Europe Live, as well as at The All-Star Game in New Orleans. Ade travelled to the Beijing Paralympics for the BBC in 2008 to commentate on the wheelchair basketball and covered the Basketball Final for the Paralympic World Cup (BBC2) for the third year running in May 2009. He has previously covered the European Championships for BBC2’s Grandstand and reported for BBC1’s weekly Sportsround series. Ade hosted his own documentary for Radio Five Live, A Pair of Trainers, which saw him follow the personal progress of two unlikely fitness candidates.

2005 saw Ade Adepitan participate in Beyond Boundaries, a four part documentary series for BBC2, which took him on the trek of a lifetime across the rainforests, deserts, rivers and mountains of Nicaragua.   A year later, he was asked to present ITV1’s The Boat Show from the Atlantic Ocean.   Ade has regularly reported for BBC1’s Holiday series having travelled to France, scuba dived in Mexico, gone on safari in Kenya and the Gambia, skied in Canada and America as well as filming in Bonaire and Curacao in the Caribbean.  He took on a new challenge in 2006 with his first principle acting role for BBC1’s popular kids’ drama, Desperados.  He has also appeared in Brit feature film Freight, ITV1’s Hardware and BBC1’s Casualty.

An instantly recognisable face, Ade appeared in the high profile idents for BBC1 and presented BBC’s daily X-Change programme for five years. Other credits include Tiger Tiger for Channel Five, where Ade reported on endangered species from around the globe.  Highlights included riding elephants while looking for tigers in India, and swimming with sharks in Australia, while personal triumphs included overcoming his fear of water and night walks in the depths of the African jungle.  He also presented Dream Ticket for LWT in which he explored Jamaica and went diving in the Seychelles.

Ade has done a number of high profile public speaking engagements including the launch of the 2012 Olympic bid at the Royal Opera House alongside Tony Blair.  He works extensively in the UK giving motivational speeches to schools, charities and businesses including The Royal Mail, BUPA, NSPCC, Lloyds TSB and BT. 

He has represented Great Britain at the Olympics in Athens 2004 (Bronze) and Sydney 2000 plus competing in The European (Silver) and World Championships (Gold).  Ade’s energy and enthusiasm comes through in everything he does, making him an ideal ambassador for the NSPCC as well as patron for The Association of Wheelchair Children and Scope.  He is an Ambassador for London’s 2012 Olympic Bid, features in their high profile poster campaign and was an integral part of the delegation that went to Singapore to present to the Olympic committee to help bring the games to London.  In 2006, Ade was given an honorary Doctorate by Loughborough University and had the honour of being awarded an MBE for his contribution to disabled sport in the Queen’s 2005 Birthday Honours.

In 2007 Ade took on the challenge of the London Marathon, which he completed in just over two and a half hours. Not one to sit on the sidelines, Ade’s new sporting passion is wheelchair tennis. He can often be seen at Roehampton early in the mornings practicing his killer serve!


Fee Group: £5k - £10k