Two Great British Sporting Traditions - for the sake of my foreign friends...!

The last two weekends have held two famous annual British events, - ones which I have taken notice of at any rate. (There are plenty more such events which go right over my head, like the football and rugby championships, which I ignore if at all possible.)

Last Saturday it was "The Boat Race" - the annual race between Oxford and Cambridge University boat clubs, held along a stretch of the Thames in London. Thousands of people flock to the river to watch the Light Blues and the Dark Blues race by. But this year, an Australian anti-elitist protestor jumped into the river, into the path of the boats, and the boats had to stop lest his head be knocked off! The protestor was dragged out of the river grinning, and the race continued, only to be disrupted again as the two boats clashed and one Oxford oar broke. Starting up again, Cambridge won, but they probably shouldn't have; meanwhile the Oxford bow rower collapsed of exhaustion and had to be airlifted away from the finish line.

In my view, freedom of speech may be a universal right, but, those rowers had given the best part of the year of their lives to training for this one event, and I think that it is pretty hard on them to have the event ruined.

This Saturday was another famous event, the Grand National - which is probably the year's most prestigious horse race, held at Aintree Racecourse. The jumps are huge and quite dangerous.

Apparently this year, it was a photo finish, the race was won by a grey horse for the first time ever, and, two horses fell at the biggest jump, known as Bechers Brook, and died.

Many people think the race should either be banned, or that there should be more done to make it safer for the horses.

This may only be a small island, but we have plenty going on here... always something to write home about...