Until I was about eight, I thought Sports Day was there for fun. Then in the summer of my eighth year, everything changed. Only idiots jumped into hessian sacks and ran three-legged. Proper children raced each other. They competed. They ran to win. They cried when they didn't! And, horror of horrors, it mattered!
I never attended another Sports Day in my life, until I had two boys of my own. I experienced something far worse - the Mothers' Race! I have never taken part in anything so dreadful in all my life.
'Ho, ho wot a lark,' I said as I made my way to the starting line "Lark?" replied one very pushy-looking mummy in trainers and running shorts. "This isn't a lark, Nicola, it's a race. And one you should want to win ... or what's the point?"
Pop! went the gun. The dust rose, the very earth shook as the Keen and Sporty Mums stampeded to the finishing line. One mother tripped and fell. The woman immediately behind her yelled "OUT OF MY WAY YOU CLUMSY COW!" and tried to step over her. But the woman grabbed her ankle and pulled her down to the ground. As she fell, she dragged down the two women on either side of her as well.
It was a picture.
Predictably it was the pushiest mummy of all who came in first - the one who'd ticked me off at the beginning. She crowed and whooped as she crossed the finishing line.
I vowed that I would never, ever, run in a Mothers' race again.
