Crowd Goes Wild comes to Rotorua

Rotorua has played host to some of the crew from popular television show The Crowd Goes Wild.

The Crowd Goes Wild reporter Meghan Mutrie and cameraman Allan George were in Rotorua yesterday and today  filming a segment for the show about the Rotorua Bike Festival.

The crew were at Rotorua's Agroventures yesterday to talk to Garth Weinberg and Sarah Pitcher-Campbell who won the Shweeb World Champs, an event which was part of the bike festival.

During their time here, they also filmed in the Redwoods interviewing Dirk Peters, Lewis Hamilton, Sam Blenkinsop and Anton Cooper and during Thursday night's episode of the programme there was a live cross to Rotorua interviewing some of the riders taking part in a BMX event.

Ms Mutrie said she was completely overwhelmed by the sense of community in Rotorua.

"I was here for half a day and already felt part of it - you can tell something great is going on here. The cycling and mountain biking community is really strong. I felt very welcomed and the individual athletes I met were phenomenal people," she said.

"It's cool to be alongside Allan for these stories based in Rotorua, as he's nostalgic about old times, showing me that he grew up here, and worked there - he speaks really highly of Rotorua. He's been here twice for work for Crowd Goes Wild now - he's a great person and it's good to see him back where his roots lie and to see how Rotorua is part of who he is now."

Mr George grew up in Rotorua and recently won an award for Maori Director of the Year.