Freak

Between the ages of about 5 and 13 I thought I was destined for sporting greatness, as at school I was the best at everything. Looking back, I realise this was because I was a freak, not freakily-talented but freakishly big. On my first day at secondary school I was the tallest in the entire school at 6 foot 4.

In junior school I had won everything. The hurdles were a joke – I ran over them. High jump was just a case of lifting my legs up and, at football, heading goals was easy, even the goalies couldn’t reach.

It all came crashing down at 13 when I stopped growing, whilst my smaller compadres carried on. Now I’m passable at most sports: I’ll give you a good game of whatever, though if you’re any good you’ll beat me.

The only sport I think I could have done professionally is darts. In my student days, when playing arrers for hours every day was an option, the 180s and big finishes started to come and I even played a few successful league games. One of the greatest sportsmen of all time in my book is Phil Taylor: the dedication and nerve of this man is legendary and to be top of any sport for so long is amazing.

Unfortunately I don’t play enough sport at the moment, and so am a few laps behind on the weight loss. I’m 19 stone 2 and should be 18 stone 10. It could be time to leave out the choc and pies out of it, well at least at the same time anyway.