Blast from the Past: On your marks for Sports Day memories

In schools all over Northern Ireland, sports day season is in full swing. Many of the old staples of primary school sports days remain – the sack race, the egg and spoon race and, that most maddening of all disciplines, the three-legged race.

Sports day was a chance for kids to let their hair down, to swap sums for the sack race and run with a potato on a spoon

Everyone has distorted memories of their own sports day years. When the subject arises we’ll say, ‘I came first in the egg and spoon race’, or ‘I was great at the long jump’. These are lies we tell ourselves. And our children.

Sports day was rife with ingenious cheating techniques. Hands up if you held the egg (the potato) with your thumb. Or procured an extra baggy sack for the advantage it gave.

There are certain truisms about the sports day of our youth. One: It was always sunny, (even if it wasn’t). Two: Being the ‘wheelbarrow’ in the wheelbarrow race was hazardous - if your pusher applied too much speed your arms buckled and your face hit the grass. Three: There was always one kid who won everything. Four: You could never hear what was being said on the megaphone. Five: The three-legged race was the litmus test of childhood friendship (especially if there was a significant height differential). Six: The shock at seeing your headmaster or mistress in shorts never leaves you. Seven: It was probably among the happiest days of your childhood.