Race for health has replaced race for wealth

BACK when I was young and it was sunny all summer long, I got a job in a garden centre.

The owner was a very observant man. One day while weeding in one of the greenhouses, I sensed that I was being watched. I turned to discover that the boss had been studying me. When I caught his eye, he said: “No matter what job you are given, you find a way of doing it sitting down.”

It was not a compliment. But he didn’t ask me to stand up. And given that he was paying me £1 an hour, I remained planted on my buttocks. But he was right. Manual work is not supposed to be a sedentary activity. And neither is sport, at least proper sport. This is why the British media annoyed me so intensely during the last Olympics.