FREDDIE Flintoff has been spending time with his family since his horrific accident on BBC car show Top Gear. He's made his return to our screens , but we take a moment to spotlight his devoted wife, Rachael Wools Flintoff. Rachael Wools Flintoff, 43, is a former model and entrepreneur.
From the age of 19, she has run a successful events company called Strawberry Promotions. She met Freddie Flintoff in 2002 at the Edgbaston cricket ground in Birmingham while at an event to promote her business. Rachael was formerly signed to the Storm Models agency and her pictures have appeared in various magazines.
At one point, she even enrolled to do a law and French degree at Sheffield University. Instead, she quit her studies and landed a job at Capital Radio before starting her business. Rachael married Top Gear presenter Freddie on March 5, 2005, at the Pavilion Road Hotel in Knightsbridge, London.
They live together in a £2.5 million home in Altrincham, Greater Manchester. Unfortunately, the couple did not enjoy a honeymoon due to Freddie's job responsibilities.
She confessed that she wasn’t taken with him at first in an interview with the Daily Mail . Wools admitted: “He really wasn't my type physically, because I generally prefer dark men, but I thought he was the funniest guy I had ever met. “He obtained my phone number and texted me a couple of times, and we went up for a drink, and I was really blown away by his charm.
” In 2015 she made an appearance on TV with Freddie when he won the Australian version of I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. In his post-jungle interview, he opened up about his battle with depression and Rachael's reaction to it. He said: "I think in some ways she was quite relieved.
I think it's because she saw me vulnerable as well." Rachael and Freddie have four children - Holly, 17, Corey, 16, Rocky, 13 and Preston, who is two. The couple's fourth child may have come as a welcomed surprise after the Top Gear host previously admitted that he didn't think he and Rachael would have any more children after Rocky.
In 2016, he told The Sun: "We thought about it. I originally wanted five but you have three and that felt like enough. I couldn't go back to the nappy stage now.
" Rachael said when Freddie was busy with his career in 2007, the former cricket star missed his family. “Holly is a complete daddy's girl, and when Andrew's around, I never get a look-in,” she said at the time. “She misses him when he's away, but she makes up for it by carrying around a photograph of him – when she has a tea party for her dolls, she puts the picture on a chair, so Daddy can be there too.
” She added that he spoke on the phone with them multiple times a day to make up for his absence. “It's much harder for him. He misses the children a lot, and foreign tours aren't nearly as exotic as they sound – you can't play cricket 24 hours a day, and there are only so many DVDs you can watch.
“But neither of us would ever complain, we are both so lucky that his career has been going well and we appreciate all the financial security it has given us.” On December 14, 2022, Freddie's son Corey broke his silence after his 45-year-old dad was airlifted to hospital after a horror crash. The Top Gear star's son said his dad is "lucky to be alive" following the terrifying high-speed smash.
The accident happened whilst he was shooting an episode of Top Gear at Dunsfold Park Aerodrome. After the incident occurred, on-site medics rushed to Freddie's aid. A source told The Sun: "Freddie is in hospital after a crash on Top Gear.
"He was driving on the track as normal. He wasn't going at high speeds - it was just an accident that could happen to anyone." Freddie is now resuming his TV career with BBC One’s Freddie Flintoff’s Field of Dreams On Tour — and he is determined to make the most of his “second chance” at life.
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