Game Changers

How can we create art which includes all our stories?

Nandi Jola is a poet, storyteller and playwright, whose work explores themes of identity. Born in South Africa, Nandi moved to Northern Ireland in 2001. Her great passion is empowering young people from marginalised backgrounds through the arts.   For the last few years, she’s lived in Belfast, and funding from The National Lottery via the Arts Council of Nor...

How can you overcome stereotypes, and get everyone swimming?

Alice Dearing has enjoyed a highly decorated career, culminating at the Tokyo Olympics. She made history, becoming the first black woman to swim for Team GB at an Olympic Games in 2021.

Alice started swimming at a young age, encouraged by her mum. She fell in love with the sport and rapid progress followed: success at county level, then regional, then national....

How can you transform peoples lives through running?

Growing up in South Africa, parkrun founder - Paul Sinton Hewitt - used running as a way to unwind and challenge himself. But it was often a solitary experience. Later, as his career took him around the world, he realised what he wanted was a running community.

And so, he dreamed up parkrun: to bring people together, to run, to chat, in a welcoming atmosphere – al...

How can you reduce loneliness for older people?  

That was the question Trevor Lyttleton asked himself in 1965. His solution was to bring together young volunteers with elderly people who had fallen off the radar, and get them chatting over a cup of tea.

The monthly tea parties grew and grew. The charity started in London, with a small group of friends in Marylebone. By the time Trevor retired as chair in 2015...

How do you create a gym which is accessible to everyone?

Many years ago, Game Changer Javeno McLean sat down in his mum’s kitchen in front of a blank sheet of paper. He sketched out his vision – a gym where the whole community, including the elderly and people with disabilities, could work up a sweat, and get fit.

After an incredible amount of hard work, persistence, and a little help from The National Lottery, Javeno achiev...

How do you inspire people to believe in a sustainable future? 

When our Game Changer - Sir Tim Smit – came across a disused clay quarry in Cornwall in the 1990s, he knew he’d found the answer. 

Sir Tim is the visionary co-founder of the Eden Project, which transformed sterile soil into a lush green landscape, and turned a forgotten quarry into a global destination for nature, culture and sustainability. The National...

What’s the best way to inspire the next generation of scientists?

That was the question facing our Game Changer Teresa Anderson MBE. She’s a physicist and the director of the Discovery Centre at Jodrell Bank. For the past 18 years, she has been driving the Observatory’s redevelopment, hoping to attract a new, diverse generation of people to gaze at the stars, and discover the wonders of space.

The stunning new exhibition...

What does it take for a person to make a big impact? What drives them? Where do they find inspiration?

In the brand-new revamped series of Game Changers, Aimee Fuller – two-time Olympian – meets ordinary people who do extraordinary things with a little help from The National Lottery.

This extra special series celebrates the 30th birthday of The National Lottery, and Aimee hears from people who have achieved remarkable th...

Homework, football boots, glucagon kit. For football-mad 14-year-old Lochlan Murdoch between school and training, managing Type 1 Diabetes has been a job 10 years in the making. However, after a devastating injury on the pitch, Lochlan was motivated and inspired to educate those around him on both the physical and mental impact of having diabetes at a young age - and the impact he would have would be well beyond his expectations.

Work pressure, isolation and stigma: the challenges facing the UK's farmers can be familiar, but as We Are Farming Minds, the Hertfordshire-based mental health charity demonstrates, these factors can be heightened for farmers, by their unique careers and remote lives. 

In this episode of Amazing Starts Here, Sam Quek catches up with Sam and Emily Stables from the National Lottery funded We Are Farming ...

How do you give surfing a rebrand? When Wave Wahines founder, Yvette Curtis’ child wanted to pursue their surfing ambitions, it opened Yvette’s eyes to the gender, class, ability and even language barriers to entry. 

But, as a sports enthusiast, she wasn’t going to standby, instead she jumped on board, ready to ride the wave of change. 

From the experiences of the young Wahines themselves, to seriously uncompeti...

In a climate of increasing awareness of fast-fashion and rising eco-anxiety globally, a pioneering textile artisan has the seeds for solution.

Justine Aldersey-Williams’ vision is as creative as it is revolutionary. Drawing inspiration from Lancashire's rich industrial heritage, Justine has used agroecological principles with native fibre and dye crops to grow her own jeans.

In this episode of Amazing Starts Here, Sam Quek he...

When you achieve your biggest ambition, what's next?

For gold-medal Paralympian, Libby Clegg this moment of pure accomplishment left her numb. But eventually it became was a turning point, one that led her to explore new avenues, take on new sports and reconnect with the parts of athletics that she had grown up relying on through thick and thin.

In this episode, Olympian Sam Quek joins Libby at her training centre to find out...

Hidden in a community hall in West Sussex, Singing Mamas is the unique choir with an eye-opening mission.

There's no auditions and you won't hear a solo, instead this musical group is singing to the tune of finding connection with other mums. The group is one of many around the globe, that through sound has proved itself as new-mum hack for de-stressing, improving mood and finding likeminded people.

In this episode, Sam Quek ...

How can a cup of coffee change someone’s life?

Café 16 in Newcastle might look like an ordinary café, but it’s impact is truly life-changing. Part of The Oswin Project and staffed by prison leavers, the cafe offers mentorship, training and employment to help reduce reoffending and empowers those with a criminal record to make different choices.

In this episode, Sam Quek meets the inspirational Fiona Sample, leading min...

What's it like going from being at the top of your sporting game and prepping for your A-Levels... to being bed bound with multiple injuries?

For Tokyo 2020 Olympic gold medallist and Paris 2024 front-runner, Alex Yee, it was a light-bulb moment that led him to push the limits of human potential, leaving a trail of inspiration in his wake.

In this episode, Alex sits down with fellow Olympian and Amazing Starts Here host, ...

Why is a group of singing mums being prescribed on the NHS? Can we “grow jeans” to make fashion more sustainable? And how do we give people leaving prison a second chance to rejoin society?

Discover the answers to these curious questions and more in the brand-new series of Amazing Starts Here, with TV presenter and Olympic gold medallist, Sam Quek. 

Join Sam on a remarkable journey across the UK as she discovers the ...

Superheroes don’t usually get to pick their missions, but The National Memorial Arboretum (an organisation which has received National Lottery funding) did. It’s on a mission to remember the lives lost during the pandemic in the same way we remember war heroes today. Amber Rose-Gill tells the origin story of the nation’s place for remembrance and its new goal.

For bonus content on the National Lottery funded projects featured in the...

Former Lottery funded Elite Athlete Eilidh Gibson fights for women and girls to experience the same life changing magic of sports as their male counterparts via her charity. Amber Rose-Gill tells the origin story of how Eilidh set up Slalom Inspires in the midst of dealing with an injury that held her back from her Olympic dreams. 

For bonus content on the National Lottery funded projects featured in the podcast head here: https://w...