STRICTLY Come Dancing star Brendan Cole breaks off from the journey to Blackpool to speak to Joanna Davis about this year's show and his new tour, which will call in to Dorset early next year.

THINK of Strictly Come Dancing and the first dancer who usually springs to mind is Brendan Cole.

Or perhaps that other chap who looks a little like Rob Brydon, but we'll get to him later.

New Zealander Brendan has, remarkably, been in the series since it hit our screens seeming like a desperate attempt to revive Bruce Forsyth's flagging TV career.

That was 2004. And how times change.

Now, easily thrashing its Saturday night rival The X Factor in the ratings, Strictly is riding high and Brendan, 39, has become as familiar a face on our screens as Simon Cowell.

Brendan waltzed away with the Glitterball trophy as winner of the first series of Strictly partnering TV news reader Natasha Kaplinsky.

But the wait for a second win continues.

Brendan and his partner Kirsty Gallacher have already been eliminated from the competition and he is still appearing on the show in the group performances.

It's gutting to no longer be competing, Brendan tells me as he is whisked up the motorway to windswept Blackpool, where the show is being filmed the next day.

He said: "I've been to Blackpool many a time with the show.

"Even though we've been knocked out I'm still very involved in the show. You get the chance to support everyone else and I'm lucky to be a part of it.

"It was a shame for Jeremy (Vine) to go out last week, such a shame he missed out on Blackpool. Everyone talks about it being such a big week of the show."

I ask Brendan which celebrity he thinks will win the competition this year.

"I think it's a really good competition this year.

"It's very unpredictable, people just don't know what's going to happen."

So, who will it be? I press Brendon.

"I think it will be a male who will win this year,"

That's all I'm getting, so I ask Brendan if perhaps it's someone from his part of the world.

"From the Antipodes?" I say.

"Maybe," he replies in tight-lipped fashion.

But, retrospectively, given Peter Andre's bottom of the leader table performance in Blackpool this past weekend, perhaps I should stick to writing about entertainment instead of trying to predict it!

But onto more consistent things - I ask Brendan what his relationship with fellow dancer Anton du Beke is like.

The two have been with the show since the beginning and are well known for their matey 'sparring' on the show.

"We've been working together for a long time and Anton really is one of my best friends.

"I have a lot of respect for him.

"I joke around that I'm better than him and he jokes around saying he's better than me - of course I'm better than him!

"We like to make fun of each other, it's all a good laugh and we have a really good friendship.

"I always say that one day they will change the furniture around and Anton and I will still be sat on it!

"I can't imagine my life without Strictly but that day will come and I'm ready for it to come whenever it comes.

"I think that Anton and I will always be connected with the show in some way," Brendan says.

Brendan and his wife Zoe recently became parents.

He said: "I can safely say that fatherhood is the best thing in the world.

"It's really hard with my job, especially just now when I had to leave my daughter for two days.

"She was saying to me 'Daddy, when are you coming back? She's at the age where she knows what's happening and she tells me she doesn't want me to go to work!

"My daughter is my little angel. I'm pretty content at home with my wife and daughter."

Conveniently, my chat with Brendan came just as Dorset Echo reporter Alex Peace was preparing to take to the floor for Weldmar Hospicecare Trust's Strictly charity challenge.

Asking Brendan what advice he would give to any budding but nervous dancer, he tells me: "You need to remember that you know what you are doing and even if you do get it wrong, it doesn't matter, it's how you recover from that.

"You will get that adrenaline rush and you have to anticipate that and take the piece out and do what you know and give 100 per cent."

But you do this so often, do you ever get nervous? I ask Brendan.

"The only time I get nervous is when I'm out of my comfort zone.

"I know I will feel nervous on the opening night of my show."

Brendan Cole: A Night to Remember is a night of entertainment ranging from ballroom magic to Latin excitement and will see Brendan hosting.

"It's the best thing I do creatively, it's a cast of 22 featuring eight fantastic dancers, live music, full of everything you would see on Strictly.

"It has intimacy, emotional pieces, ballroom and Latin and high impact dances.

"I want to give everybody in the audience a ridiculously good night," he says.

It's a massively long tour, I comment to Brendan, taking him from January 29 to April 3.

So what's his coping strategy for being on the road so long?

"You don't really need one," he says.

"It's kind of what you expect as a performer, but it is hard work.

"We feel that every performance has to be amazing, that's what spurs you on and inspires the cast to do the same.

"It's hard when you're on the road all the time and I do miss home.

"I try and be good with the diet and eat broccoli and get my protein."

*Brendan Cole: A Night To Remember is at the Concert Hall, Lighthouse, Poole on Thursday February 4 at 7.30pm.

Contact Lighthouse for tickets.