I am Gold and I am travelling with my wife who is Bronze to Madrid in March. I have been able to reserve seats for both of use in row 1 for the NCL-LHR and LHR-NCL sectors and I ave also had full choice with no restrictions on the 777s from LHR-MAD and MAD-LHR, though we are hoping for seats in the F cabin to open up.

I don't understand why I can reserve 2 seats in Row 1 and you can't though.

Due to the cabin layout you are likely to be knocked by passing passengers during boarding in 1C, so that may make someone think twice about swapping into that seat.