Dancing with the Stars champion Jason Smyth speaks about his journey in hit television show

March 17 saw the finale of hit RTÉ show Dancing with the Stars take place. 

After a very tense final, dance partners Karen Byrne and Jason Smyth were crowned winners and were presented with the coveted Glitterball trophy.

The Paralympian started off the night doing the samba to Rhythm Divine by Enrique Iglesias.

Judge Arthur told him: “This was incredible. The way you shook your body, every coconut in the world fell off the trees."

Fellow judge Loraine added: "Tonight you were out there smiling, but you were living that samba."

They ended up getting 28 points for their efforts. The pair then performed to DITA's Make It Look Easy for their showdance.

Six-time Paralympic gold medal-winning sprinter Jason, who hails from Eglinton, is legally blind due to Stargardt’s disease.

One of the reasons he decided to participate in Dancing with the Stars was to raise awareness about visual impairment and change people’s perception of what they can and cannot do. 

To demonstrate this in the finale, the duo chose to blindfold Karen to illustrate that you can dance even without having perfect vision. 

“It is my turn to step into your shoes,” said Karen during the practice rehearsal. 

The dance was described as magical and emotional by the judges and the performance earned the duo 30 points.

Afterwards they came back out with a bang to perform their last dance to Michael Bolton's Disney hit Go The Distance.

Following the celebrations of the weekend, Jason took time out to speak to the County Derry Post about his experience, stepping out of his comfort zone and what the future holds for him.

What are your thoughts on the overall experience, considering it's quite different from being an athlete?

Jason: It’s a very different experience than being an athlete. As an athlete, this is your career or this was your career and there was so much on the line when you went to compete. 

Whereas in Dancing with the Stars, it's not necessarily about your career, and therefore you don't have everything on the line every week. On that front, it felt like a different pressure. The pressure was to try to be at a decent place on national TV and get your dance right. 

For me, there are a lot of pieces I really enjoyed, because some of them reminded me of when I was an athlete. 

I enjoyed the competition. I tried to push myself to continually improve and enjoy the aspect of having the dance right by Sunday. 

You had to have the right mentality to keep pushing and persevere through the week.

Was blindfold Karen for the finale dance a personal choice to raise awareness around visual impairment?

Jason: It was something that we had mentioned early on, the potential to do it. So for me, I had to get to a certain level before it was realistic. It is also the kind of thing you have to do in the finale rather than halfway through the competition.

In week three, we did this little piece around what I could see. People could see my vision through the camera so for me that was the first step in trying to get people to understand what I can see. 

I've talked about this whole experience being out of my comfort zone but Karen also had to show that it is possible for her to get out of her comfort zone. And then everybody could see I was being able to lead and guide her.

[It is important to know] what's the message rather than just dancing because you're a good dancer. For people to relate and connect, there's got to be a deeper message and that's what we tried.

How was stepping out of your comfort zone and going dancing on national television? 

Jason: It was like everything, difficult at times. I asked myself why did I even bother doing this because unfortunately getting out of your comfort zone isn't easy. But I think when you get to the other side of it, where you realise that it is worth it and sometimes you just have to keep pushing through the difficult moments to reap the rewards.

For me, I've found it difficult at times but an incredible experience. Ultimately getting out of your comfort zone, you learn, develop, improve and learn to build resilience, which I also think helps you face other challenges in life.

As a father of two girls who are also dancing, what were the reactions of your wee girls?

Jason: They loved it. Even while going to school there yesterday, they were over the moon. My wife phoned me after she was taking them and then the youngest one was talking and said: ‘Mummy, do you know, we're so lucky we have a dancing champion in our house now?’. They've really been able to be part of the experience. For me, I hope they look at me and how I've embraced this challenge, the success and influences them in everything they do in their life.

Are you going to continue to dance or is it a closed chapter?

Jason: I don't know. I never thought dancing would be a chapter that I would open. I don't know if I can close it as my two girls dance. I will always be somewhat involved through them. I know my wife made a few jokes about us going to dance classes so who knows what the future is!