Some of the best stories
From monumental charity efforts to an emotional first birthday and the world’s biggest rugby fan, here are some of the things that happened in the Cynon Valley during 2016 which made us smile. Reporter Anwen Williams looks back on some of our favourite st
Paul Davies ran the Nos Galan with a FRIDGE on his back – and he raised a cool sum of £2,000 for charity
Paul’s Nos Galan exploits may have taken place hours before 2016 began – but a few days later in January he was delighted to announce he was on course to raise £2,000 for cancer charity Latch.
The Hirwaun fireman completed the 3.2-mile course of the New Year’s Eve run through Mountain Ash in 29 minutes and 15 seconds.
He said: “I was just taken aback by all the support – everyone was talking about the fridge.
“The noise people were making was deafening, especially as we came into the town centre.”
Teacher by day, a caricature artist by night – Richard Bradbeer’s celeb caricatures are fantastic!
Richard, 40, from Aberdare , spends most of his free time creating comical and exaggerated caricature drawings of celebrities – and the father-oftwo juggles his hobby with his job as an art teacher at St John Baptist School.
Floyd Mayweather, the Welsh rugby team, Derek Brockway (as a dracula) and Gareth Bale are among his wonderful designs.
“Before I draw the caricatures I picture in my head what features I’m going to exaggerate. The most important features are the nose, neck and eyes – most of the central features of the face,” he said in March.
Eiriana Mari James – the little girl who underwent lifesaving heart surgery – defied the odds to celebrate her first birthday
Born with a rare form of congenital heart disease, little Eiriana underwent a seven-hour operation at just 12 days old in 2015 – and full heart surgery four months later. But, against all odds, she made incredible progress.
So much so, that Eiriana’s parents Rhian Shellard and Gareth James threw a big party in the clubhouse of Aberdare RFC to mark her birthday on April 2.
Rhian, from Cwmbach, described their daughter as a “little miracle”, and said: “She has a wicked personality and she’s always smiling.”
Justin Davies was officially named the world’s greatest rugby fan by Guinness World Records
During June, 44-yearold Justin from Aberdare was honoured for watching more matches during a single tournament than anyone, ever.
He clinched the Guinness record after attending 28 Rugby World Cup games during the 2015 tournament. Having emi- grated to New Zealand 15 years ago, he travelled more than 18,000 miles before a ball was kicked and spent £3,000 on match tickets, plus countless more on hotels.
Having been presented the award by Wales star Sam Warburton, Justin said of his adventure: “The trickiest was watching Romania and Canada play in Leicester followed by Fiji and Uruguay in Milton Keynes on the same day.”
Swansea City fan Lewys Prendergast had to change his name to Robert Earnshaw after a Twitter bet backfired
“If Eder scores the winner I’ll honestly change my name to Robert Earnshaw.”
Those were the famous last words of the Aberdare football fan on Twitter, confident that ex-Swans player Eder wouldn’t make an impact on the Euro 2016 final for Wales’ conquerors Portugal.
So when the striker fired in an incredible winner from distance to win the trophy, Lewys reluctantly changed his name on Twitter to former Bluebird Robert Earnshaw. “I was stunned, I was so shocked. I seen it out the corner of my eye and didn’t realise it was him,” he reflected.
These sisters re-created a photo taken 54 years ago at the re-opened outdoor paddling pool in Penrhiwceiber
Two photos, 50 years apart - and it made a great tale in August.
Angela Davies, 58, of Abercynon , and her big sister Irene Fox, 64, from Penrhiwceiber, unearthed an old photo taken at the Lee Gardens paddling pool in Penrhiwceiber back in 1962. The pool was re-opening in 2016 after a great community effort - so they posed to recreate the photo.
“It brought back to us exactly how much we enjoyed going there as children, and there’s still that community spirit there today,” said Angela.
Hirwaun identical twins celebrated identical A-level results and were off to study the same subject at the same university
Rory and Ryan Doolan celebrated getting into the same Bath University course after achieving exactly same A-level results.
After opening their results in August - at exactly the same time, of course - they found they had both received an A in Maths, an A in Geography and a B in Physics. They celebrated by posing for photos in a bath!
Ryan said: “Going to the same university just makes sense, we’ve always studied together and helped each other, and that’s the plan for university.”