The amazing Phil Keoghan - much more than a TV star

FRIDAY, JAN. 20: It’s not every day you get to sit with one of the most recognizable faces on international TV and shoot the breeze for half an hour so. But this week I did. And boy, am I glad I did.

Phil Keoghan is the host and one of the Executive Producers of The Amazing Race. He does a wonderful job, comes across on screen and in real life as both understanding and humble, and has an engaging aura. But this isn’t where he starts and stops.

There is an intellectual depth to Phil and a heart that beats for a cause — the way it should in all of us. His cause is the National Multiple Sclerosis Society — of which Carolyn Armstrong is the tireless, Bermuda-based President. This is why Phil was in Bermuda this week.

It wasn’t to do an amazing bike race around Bermuda as most media outlets reported — he was here to help raise money and awareness for the estimated 50 MS patients living here.

And part of his way of achieving this was to show the film he made recently that raised a whopping half-million dollars at the time and is now nudging $1million. All of which he graciously donates to the MS Society. All of it.

The film is brilliant, a must-watch, and was done at an enormous financial, physical and mental cost to, the amazing Mr Keoghan.

Rewards

“When you get the chance in life to do something for others that requires you to go beyond your comfort zone, or that pushes you physically and mentally to the edge, and you then do it — well, the personal rewards are compelling,” he said.

So — what did he do?

Well, like me, Phil is an ‘over 40’ athlete who still trains and still competes. I’m a swimmer, he’s a cyclist.

He decided one day to ride from his home in LA across the country to New York. He had an immovable deadline, because he needed to be in NY at a certain time to film a leg of The Amazing Race. There was NO room for error, fatigue, injury, illness or stopping: “I was training daily in LA anyway,” he said, “but I had to find even more time as this was a 3,500 mile bike ride in all sorts of weather. I knew it would be tough.”

The movie is about this trek. It’s also about the everyday people he met along the way; the cyclists of all ages from the large cities and small towns who rode alongside him for mile after mile. It is about the generosity of the human spirit.

Phil’s father John, New Zealand born and raised, was part of the support crew.

At times Phil was doing Olympic Time Trial speeds along highways and byways. “I broke a personal road riding best of 56 miles per hour on one stage,” Phil said. He also nearly broke his cheekbone, his hip and his spirit in an awful crash 2,000 miles into the ride. But he got back up, blood streaming from the open wounds and continued. Remember, he had a deadline to meet. He braved icy winds, sandstorms, drizzling rain and snow on his epic journey. And all the time he was driven by the fact that MS patients deal with what he was going through — daily. “They are always tired. And every time I was spent, I was inspired by yet another MS patient whose story touched me. If they deal with tiredness on a daily basis, surely I can handle this for 40 days.”And he did.

He rode through pain, spurred on by the fact his uncle is an MS patient. And along this life-changing journey, Phil Keoghan discovered something — and it made him change his view about the already good relationship he had with his father: “I set out wanting him to be proud of me, wanting him to see that what I was doing was hard and that his son was man enough for it.

“And I never got that sense from him — but after that heavy crash I had, I realized why — dads are driven by their love of their children and they worry — and he worried for my safety because he saw how fragile life is, and it overcame whatever pride I was trying to elicit from him. We grew even closer as a result.”

That storyline is one of the most touching in the movie.

There is much to be learned about kindness, relationships and human endeavour in this movie.

“I lost 17 pounds of my body weight doing that ride,” Phil said, “but I made a movie that I am proud of and that I can leave behind for my daughter and her children.”

The movie is called The Ride and it takes you on an emotional ride of your own as you watch —  it reveals the soul of a human being who was put on this earth to not only entertain, but help others.

The movie is available on iTunes for $3, or the DVD via Amazon for $12. Proceeds go to the Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Ric Chapman is the Executive Producer of SONGOPOLY TV